Depths of the Unknown
by Breecer1
Summary: "What does this world have to offer, when I'm not from it? Why should I care about it, or the denizens in it, if they aren't even the same as me? Why am I even here?" Join a young man on a journey not of exploration or discovery, but survival. A quest for saving the world, and for saving something more. Giving a soul a second chance may have more repercussions than you thought.
1. Chapter 1: A New Beginning

_All things must come to an end, and the price of rebirth must be paid in blood._

 _If not, then may the gods have mercy on your soul.. -Unknown, XXXX_

 _To anyone who reads this, know that I am not perfect. I am not a role model. You should not strive to be like me. I am not what others expect me to be._

 _I'm just a boy with not enough time on his hands, and less in his heart._

 _If all of my attempts have failed so far to dissuade you from learning about me, if you're one of those people who want to learn from others mistakes, so that they will not repeat in the future. Or you're simply a curious one who wishes to know my story, I won't judge you._

 _Hell, I'm the last person in the entire universe who should do that. Nobody should ever have to go through what I went through._

 _Nobody remembers their death..._

 _So why do I?_

 _Chapter 1: A new beginning_

I never thought I'd grow up for a second time. I don't even really think that I deserve another chance. Especially not where I live now. I would have thought that I'd go to heaven, and if I was not allowed to enter its gates, then I thought that maybe for the rest of my eternal life, I would wander the earth as a formless phantom for however long the earth existed, scaring numerous unsuspecting people into running away from their homes with their tails between their legs. At least, I hoped that one of the two might happen. There's actually a third thing that could've happened but I really don't want to think about that one. I already dislike summer, I don't need to be reminded of it for the rest of my eternal life.

Anyways, what DID happen was far different than what I could ever imagine.

When I finally made it to the end of the road of life, I was greeted by a rather abrupt change in my scenery. What had originally been a hospital room with my loved ones surrounding me, crying over my failing fallen body, had turned into quite literally the opposite of existence.

There was nothing at all, not a damn thing in sight.

All that I could see was a sheer vastness of nothing. There was no light, darkness seeped in from everywhere in my vision. Even if there was light, I doubt that I could have even saw my own body, because there's nothing there to be seen. I'm just a lost soul, with nothing to call my own, no path for me to follow. I guess fate played me a cruel hand in the end. Thanks fate, you're really looking out for me.

I wondered if I'd ever get to leave this vacuum of nothingness, or if I was doomed to forever stay alone in the darkness. I wondered if both heaven and hell decided that I belonged in neither, and forced me to stay here, in this purgatory, this prison of unending darkness.

My answers, however, would soon be answered. Just not the way I expected them to be. I could feel something, out there in the darkness. What was it exactly, I couldn't know for certain but it felt strangely familiar.

 **Could that have been a heartbeat that I just felt?**

At first the feeling of a rhythmic pulse sounded far away, as if I was separated from it almost entirely. As if it was on the other side of the world. But then it became louder and louder, steadily moving closer towards my shapeless being. The feeling became really peculiar when it felt like it was emanating from me, like it became a part of me.

 **Was this my own heartbeat?**

At this point, I had almost without a shadow of a doubt that this was indeed my own heartbeat, but what exactly did that mean? Was I still alive in the real world? Can I even come back to it, and live with my friends and family members once more?

My answers would have to wait, unfortunately, for something even stranger happened. Unlike the beating of what I thought was my own heart, something else was beating. But it wasn't occurring in a familiar pattern that I've known for my entire life. No, this was a periodical in and out kind of beating. The kind that would normally be associated with labor, like mining rocks, or digging up dirt with a shovel. Someone was pounding something, I couldn't tell what exactly.

 **Who was doing this? Why can I hear them if I can't even see what they're doing?**

My heart began to race as the sounds of this weird beating became more ferocious, like it had turned into someone trying to escape from something. From what, I had no clue. After what felt like a millennium, it began to slowly stop, and then I heard a really perplexing sound.

 **Was that the sound of an egg cracking?**

No seriously, what in the hell was that sound?! When I was on my death bed, did someone randomly decide to crack open an egg and try to make an omelet, in the hopes of possibly waking me up? I had no objections to that, if I was coming back from the dead, I'd probably be starving; I like eggs anyway. It just seemed to me that something was just not right here. In addition to this bizarre sound, my surroundings became a blinding white. I had no hope of seeing anything in front of me, exactly the same as before but at least light was normally associated with good, and I for one like good things.

I was then assaulted by a barrage of different sounds, all thankfully muffled by what I initially assumed was my awakening back from the dead, but still audible enough to make me a little uneasy.

I heard voices in the haze of white light, one sounded deep and masculine, and the other two sounded soft and feminine. Their voices became more and more clearer as the light slowly began to fade. Instead of seeing the bodies that belonged to these new voices, The familiar darkness surrounded me once more, apparently unhappy with my sudden leaving earlier, and tried its best to wrestle me once more to the depths of the unknown. Something was off here, There's _three_ unintelligible voices in the darkness, not six. I should know since… I died right in front of them.

It was at that moment when I came to a startling realization. Something that I have been wondering for awhile, but with the new pieces of evidence that I have gathered, what with the sounds of something pounding with an erratic and unpredictable pattern, and three beings around me, only one thing was definitely for certain. No question about it.

I didn't wake up. In addition to my pile of evidence, my gut feeling told me something that I hesitantly had to agree with, for there was no other explanation for what happened to me.

I think I've just been born.

It seemed so unlikely, so impossibly ridiculous! This stuff only happens in really bad stories I've read on the internet. How could I be born again if I had just died? Did I just restart my life, starting at the very beginning, or did I birth as someone else entirely? I have heard of a few theories of rebirth, some people thought that life itself was like an endless cycle of death and rebirth, so could they have been right all along?

My vision remained dark, I couldn't see a thing, and I could not begin to try and open my eyes, which I guess makes sense because technically, I was just born minutes earlier, though it still irked me. My hearing, however, was getting better. I heard fragments of the words that the voices spoke, and I got a rough idea of what they actually said.

"Oh - look at him! He's such a precious little thing, isn't he?"

At least she sounded somewhat similar to my own mother. I hoped that she wouldn't be a mother who could care less about their children. I'd hate to be stuck with a despicable woman like that for years. Although she will probably never be like my own mother.

 _The one who actually gave birth to me. The one I had to leave behind, without saying a word._

I got a few snippets more of what the three said, but nothing struck out as being too odd or unusual (There was something else that confused and slightly irritated me, the third voice did sound a little like my "mother" but she rolled her s's for far longer than what anybody with even an inkling of knowledge about the English language would normally say) except for one other thing.

"I know -, what a fine looking owlet we have here. I know that he'll do great things when he grows up, I can feel it in my gizzard as plain as the night sky!"

He obviously said more but it was becoming harder and harder to hear what exactly the three were saying. I think I was falling asleep again. My new dad sounded excited at the prospect of a worthy heir, but I found myself sorely lacking in this new vocabulary they used.

Gizzard. I knew what it was, it's something that a lot of birds have, and also maybe a food that you eat at a local KFC, but I don't see how it could be used to judge something or someone, nor how you could ever feel such a thing. Maybe it was like how people sometimes go with their gut feeling. I was honestly more concerned with the thing he said before talking about the night sky and organs of birds found battered and fried at a restaurant.

 _ **Owlet.**_

He was talking about me, right? It couldn't have been anyone else in the vicinity, he was without a doubt, describing what I was. Who I could be.

As an owlet.

I wasn't that daft to not know what an owlet was. Owlets were basically baby owls, and now I must be one of them. No human calls their child an owlet, except maybe the mentally unhinged who really shouldn't have kids in the first place, but I digress.

The idea of me being an owl started to make me more and more anxious about the numerous things that owls had to do in order to survive in their daily lives. If they didn't, they would die.

Things like, hunting and gathering food, which would have been alright with me, if I didn't recall that all owls were carnivorous in nature, so the prospect of eating any kind of vegetable went right out the window. No berries, mushrooms, nada, Zilch. Unless the owls of this place, this world, had a different diet than the ones back home. The chances of that were sadly low, so I ruled that out as a possibility.

Then there was the reversed sleep schedule, owls typically slept during the day and woke up at dusk. I was a night owl growing up (the irony in that was not lost to me), but I don't think I'll ever get used to sleeping during the day. Not for a good long while.

There was one more thing that stood out from everything else, completely eclipsing my previous worries over being an owl. It was something that I will admit, scared me to my core.

 _Flying._

I know that the fear of flight was slightly abnormal, but everybody has something that frightens them, everybody has a weakness. And mine was flight. Although it wasn't always like that. Once there was a time where I wanted to fly. I wanted to see the world from up above, looking down at the people below. The wildlife, trees, rivers, oceans, clouds.

When I was a little kid, no older than eight years old, my parents had the bright idea to buy plane tickets to Hawaii for the summer. We'd go on vacation for about two weeks sleeping in a decent hotel in Oahu, the capital city of the island state. It sounds great, doesn't it? Who wouldn't want to go to an island known for its beaches, warm clear ocean blue water all year round, a unique ecosystem unlike anything we have in consistently cold Maine, and so many other great things. You'd be an idiot to _not_ want to go, right?

Oh, how wrong I was.

On that dreary day (really any day was just that to be honest), we packed up all our bags in the early morning and me, my brother, and my sister were ushered into the backseats of dad's worn-down yet somehow still functional truck. As usual, I sat in the middle, my brother to my left, and my sister to the right. Mom complacently rested in the front seat (It was really freaking rare for her to be awake when dad was driving) while dad fiddled with the GPS and the rear-view mirror. He peered up at the reflective surface and smiled at us with his trademark lopsided goofy grin that never failed to put us in a good mood for the day.

"Are you kids ready for the greatest vacation of your lives?" He asked, putting in a small amount of energy into the question. The amount of times me and my brother, and even my sister, said yes over and over could have ranged from twenty, to two thousand.

" _Yeah daddy, I'm so pumped for this vacation!" My brother Dylan, the most vocal out of the trio, had exclaimed._

" _I don't know about you guys, but once we get there, I am so gonna sleep in for the day." My sister Abby, always the one with the most plans to sleep anywhere, at any time, had tiredly stated._

" _I want to see all the different animals daddy! There's dolphins, birds, sharks, and so many others that I can't say the names to," I'd said, my interest in ecology already starting to show._

Thing is, we were so jumpy and giddy for our vacation (at least me and Dylan) that we momentarily forgot that mom was still trying to catch some zz's. Dad put a finger to his mouth, shushing us, but it was too late. She grumbled under her breath about not getting enough sleep and shook around for a bit, trying to find the perfect sweet spot for her slumber. He let out a sigh, relieved that mom didn't go off on us with one of her infamous speeches about "Not being considerate to others," and "Not understanding how tiresome her job was". The message could not have been any clearer. Don't wake up a woman who hasn't slept for more than eight hours in a week, even if she's your mother.

It was one of the few times where I didn't mind sitting in the middle (the hump as I like to call it), because it was all going to be worth it. Me and Dylan played some co-op games on our Nintendo Ds's (Mario Kart was an all-star favorite for us) while our sister also funnily enough slept in a similar position as mom. The heavy sleeper gene was passed down from mother to daughter. Abby was older than both of us, and if we woke her up now, we would end up going to Hawaii in full body casts, so we put them on mute and quietly whispered to each other.

We arrived at the airport with our luggage in tow, checked in at the desk, and sat down on the drab seats, waiting impatiently for those precious words to be spoken on the intercom. Once they did, me and Dylan rushed to the jet-way, dad was dragging more of the heavier bags and was lagging far behind with Abby and mom letting out a synchronized set of yawns in front of him.

Dylan instantaneously called the window seat, and my mood was slightly dampened because now I had to sit in between my siblings for the second time today. A stewardess dressed in all blue gave us instructions on how to use our seat-belts (The population of people who don't know how to use it must be in the hundreds if they have to explain to it to us like toddlers) with as much energy as one could muster without passing out on the spot due to boredom.

The plane rumbled like a great beast of old as it began to take off the runway, and this is the moment of time where everything took a turn for the worse. An hour into the flight, something called turbulence was occurring, and it did not stop until the very end of the journey to the first airport at Texas. I tried many things to calm my nerves, like playing games with Dylan again, but that failed. I asked dad who was behind me for some gum, that also didn't work. I even went to the cramped bathroom, hoping that whatever was causing my debilitating discomfort could be related to my bodily functions. Nope, that wasn't it.

Wanna know what did work? It wasn't anything earth-shattering but it still works to this day, even if it has lost some effectiveness over the years. imagining I was with my family, doesn't matter where we were, as long as we were having fun. My dog Rocky, lying on my lap while we watched cartoons or cheesy sitcoms on TV. When we got off, the second plane in Texas left almost as fast as we had arrived, and this time, I was prepared.

The time we spent together in Hawaii swimming in the water with the waves rolling close by, making poorly constructed sandcastles and pretending that the plastic buckets were the towers, holding princesses who awaited their knights in shining armor, Sleeping in the hotel bed with my siblings as we drifted off into blissful slumber.

The time we had together before I left them, I _never_ want to forget. Who and what I was, I hope I never forget.

Now I'm some nocturnal bird of prey, in a tree with animals masquerading as my parents in a world I don't belong in.

I swear, this might be the _shittiest_ thing that has ever happened to me, and that was saying a lot. This was more shitty than my freaking death! And that was agonizing to deal with, just slowly ticking off the days until I finally died from something I had almost no control over.

Not only that, but now I'm the one who's supposed to fly. I'm the one who has wings now, even if I can't feel them right now, they're still there. They're still going to be there. For the rest of my "second" life.

This time, _I am_ that airplane in the skies above. And I _hated_ that.

Can't forget that I'm a baby bird, I'm going to be fed disgusting slop (way more disgusting than what humans feed their own kin) for at least a week or two. Maybe more if I'm not correct about how owls function in this God-forsaken place I found myself in. Now that I think about it, where even am I again? The voices weren't there anymore, I was back in the cold reaches of the dark for what, the third time now? Was this how it was like when I was first born, an empty space filled with absolutely nothing? That's just fantastic.

If you couldn't tell already, I'm already getting sick and tired of this place. There's nothing at all, and it wasn't like it was in my mind, if it was, then theoretically, I could create anything I wanted to. I could make a nice little forest for me to walk in, to take in those sounds that I grew to love over the years. Heck, I could even try to recreate my life again, back when everything was much simpler.

I've been beating around the bush awhile as to why exactly I died in a hospital prematurely as a teenager rather than an old man in front of my family and friends. I guess I ought to tell that to you sooner or later.

The reason why I died so early in life, is simply because of this.

 **Bad luck. Bad luck and bad judgment on my part.**

I knew for a fact that if I hadn't went on that stupid road trip with some of my morally questionable and unpredictable, pseudo-intelligent _friends_ , then I wouldn't be here. I knew I should've just stayed home, called up some of my actual friends. The people that always stuck by me through thick and thin no matter what.

If any of you are listening right now, if you can hear me through whatever means available to you, then… I'm sorry. I was being pressured by what felt like everyone in the entire school, and I forgot about you guys. I should have listened to you before any of this happened. I can't even cry in here. Whatever kind of forces that sent me here wouldn't allow it. One question was all that I wanted, some way, somehow, I just want to know one thing.

 **Why?**

A deafening silence was my only answer . There's no god or any other supernatural entity to tell me what I wanted to hear, what I needed to hear.

 _I don't even know if there is one anymore._

In all my life, I have never felt so alone until now. It's a terrible feeling, knowing that there's nobody around who can feel your pain. Nobody to hold your hand, whispering sweet nothings softly in your ear. Nobody to speak to, to share knowledge with.

Taking away a thing that a lot of us, including myself, have neglected for years, is utter torture. Death could be a better alternative, but I know that's not true.

 _After all, I've died before._

The sound of my heartbeat returning to me once more signaled that my time was up. I was now returning back to the land of the living. I suppose that anything at this point was better than a cold, dark and desolate wasteland of space, but I suspected that this wouldn't be the last time I'd be here.

The darkness didn't go away immediately, par for the course, but my sense of sound returned to me, albeit slowly. I thought that the voices of my avian parents would have been practically gushing at the sight of me waking up from my slumber, yet I did not hear them. They were nowhere to be heard.

So, if I couldn't hear them, what could that mean? Did they leave me because I took too long to wake up? That seemed highly unlikely, they sounded quite excited and eager to witness my awakening into this world.

The rest of my senses returned to me, and I knew something was wrong, _very_ wrong. As soon as the sense of smell came rushing back to me, a disturbing realization smacked me right upside my head, and smashed it down onto the ground below.

 **SOMETHING WAS BURNING.**

I really do doubt that owls in any world could utilize grills and have family barbecues, so it must have been the trees. A fire was brewing, and I'm right in the middle of it. A heavy stifling smoke entered my nostrils, causing me to cough painfully as it reached into my tiny little lungs. No child, let alone a newborn baby, could resist the effects of smoke inhalation for long, and I was no exception. I had to get out of this place, preferably right now.

There were two major problems that I had to overcome, and I have no idea how to solve them. First, I have almost no knowledge of how my body functions now. Two, how was I even going to get out of here if I've just been born very recently?

Regardless, I had to try. I don't plan on dying for a second time, and whoever brought me here (if someone actually did bring me here) would surely be furious if I died right now.

I painstakingly began to open my eyes, wincing in pain when the smoke felt like it was seeping into my eyeballs. It didn't take long until I could finally see where I was born at, and more importantly, where to escape from the infernal flames. What I saw was not surprising to me. An owl's hollow wrapped in wildfire, shrouded by nature's tried and true method of cleansing the earth.

 **And I was right in the middle of it.**

My first official step into this new, alien world ended up with me falling flat on my face onto what felt like a makeshift bed made out of an assortment of materials owls used to make their nests. Thankfully, it wasn't that painful, but now I had absolutely no clue how to get up again. I couldn't use my arms to lift myself up because I don't even have the upper body strength to pull myself back up. My arms didn't end in hands and fingers anymore. Dark thoughts invaded my mind like an army of ancient warriors marching forward, swords drawn and shields raised, and I didn't have the manpower nor the willpower to push them back.

 _Why should I even bother at this point? I'm going to die as a newborn freak of an animal. An anomaly among the masses._

 _An outcast._

Tears slid down my eyes, and my vision became blurry. There's nothing for me now, is there? I'm just going to die again, and I don't think that I can come back this time. The smoke and flames increased in their intensity, I started coughing violently and without pause, my heart beating faster and faster.

My entry into this world came as quickly as it went. There was no grand sendoff, nobody to witness my death this time. This time, I was dead for good. No coming back to a place I already left.

At least, I thought so...

Just before my inevitable death, I could faintly hear something over the sounds of the raging fire. It wasn't the sounds of branches or trees falling down, this sounded different. Something more organic, alive. And then, I finally heard something that I would never forget.

A calming voice in the eye of the storm.

"Everything's going to be okay little fella. You're not dying on my watch."

And with that, the world faded to black, yet again. The voice's reassurance gave me at least some semblance of hope. I had a feeling that this place wouldn't be such a cold prison of emptiness. Maybe this time, it would welcome me in with open arms. One thing was for certain...

 **Nobody deserves to die twice.**

 _Somewhere in the reaches of space and time, a door will close. And so it will be, another one will open.._


	2. Chapter 2:The past: Revisited

_Chapter 2: The past, revisited_

This place, this darkness, took me back once again. I give it so little yet it gives me so much.

But the darkness is not perfect. It's the same as any other being or entity in the universe. Anybody could try to be perfect, and some individuals may seem to appear perfect, but nobody is truly perfect. Not even the darkness. Not the light for that matter. If any of us were perfect, than that would ruin one of our greatest strengths as sentient beings.

The ability to better oneself and improve upon what has already been established in our lives, and in our hearts.

Now that I've got that out of the way, (Me being here was starting to make me think like some sort of philosopher or something, which by no means am I one, going on and on about stupid stuff would probably be more correct. I had to do _something_ in here, it might as well be productive, or insightful. If I didn't do that, I'd end up at an owl mental asylum, if they even have that) I should talk more about the situation I found myself in back in the living world.

More specifically, the living _owl_ world. A world that I'm going to be in for quite a long time, if I did not manage to die twice.

However, if I did indeed perish in the fires, what could that mean for me? Am I dead for good this time? Why would me, of all people, be given a second chance (a rather unnecessary and frankly unwanted one at that) if I ended up dying unceremoniously from something I had virtually no control over? That defeats the purpose of a second chance. _It wouldn't be the first time I died due to outside forces..._

 **To begin again. A fresh start on the path of life.**

It didn't make any sense to me. I wonder if fate (that fickle scoundrel of a thing) wanted to keep me on my toes. Or would it be talons now? Maybe it's just laughing its ass off because of my unfair beginning? Or… could have it been something else? Perhaps, someone else?

I always had my doubts about the existence of otherworldly beings who either lived in the skies above or in the deepest depths of the earth, forever burning in pain and agony. I doubt that they and their realms really do exist in another plane far removed from our own. If they did, wouldn't I have been sent to one of them? This place, this darkness, did not feel like anything like how people back home described them to be.

There was no eternal fires of damnation, and yet, there was also no heavenly singing from angels above, and endless clouds filled with pure light. This place could not be a purgatory, for that implied that I was to be judged for my actions, and would eventually be sent to one or the other. How could I be judged if there was no one there _to_ judge me? Especially if now I'm…

I mentally sighed to myself, catching myself in the act of rambling off like a lunatic. I should try to get back to what was really important. What _actually_ mattered in the long run.

 **What if I didn't die?**

So if I did manage to survive, and that voice that reached out to me before everything went silent saved me from yet another untimely demise (even if I think I don't deserve this, after everything that just happened, I don't want to go through it all over again, it's way, _way_ too early for that), what would happen next?

My questions would have to wait once more, so they set themselves upon the growing pile of things that needed to be explained sooner or later. The darkness slowly dissipated, leaving only the blankness of light behind.

Wait, what? This only happened once, and that was when I came into this world for the first time. That kind of light was sort of comforting to me. I felt calm when I saw it.

This light, for whatever reason, did not. It didn't feel like it at all. My vision started to clear up, and I could actually see my own body. My own, human body.

 _Before it started rotting in the ground. Before the pain and suffering._

My current attire was the one I always wore right before everything was ripped away from me. A black hoodie with three white stripes going down each sleeve, blue jeans that were ripped in a few places, and black sports shoes. My choice in what color my clothes were always gravitated towards black, which technically was considered to be the absence of color itself. I never really got out of that "Rebellious punk" phase.

My surroundings shifted to a very familiar scenery, one I have known for almost all my life. It was… my home. Right in front of me, the home I was raised in, the one that helped make me who I am right now. An unassuming two story house built with brick and mortar.

I walked towards the front door hastily and pulled it open, not noticing how my home was the only thing in sight, with a sea of everlasting white surrounding it from all sides. I didn't care, I just wanted to see for my own eyes. No, I _needed_ to see it, if this was going to be the last time I could be here and interact with it, I needed to make it special. Something that I hope I won't forget for a very, very long time.

A comforting kitchen awaited me at the front door, almost beckoning to me. I can still remember me and my parents preparing meals for the family. The smell of a good old fashioned home cooked meal. Rocky endlessly wagging his tail for the food that would inevitably be given to him at the dinner table. We didn't feed him every time, but when we did, we made it special. For both him and us.

 _He sadly wasn't here to greet me._

I opened the refrigerator, and was greeted to an assortment of all kinds of foods. Blocks of cheese (Me and my mom hated those cheap generic no name brand slices of cheese) ranging from cheddar and Colby Jack to Swiss . A gallon of milk on the top shelf, leftovers from previous dinners packed into containers with red lids on top of them. I reached into the fridge and grabbed one of them to see what was in it. I removed the lid, but I was dumbfounded that what I just opened did not have _anything_ in it.

 _Is this some kind of joke?_

The living room was next, right beside the dining room. A large comfy brown couch that I've slept on countless times, two armchairs on opposite sides of the room, with a large tv leaning on one of the walls, resting on top of a long table, with a movie player right next to it. A black cabinet chocked full of all kinds of movies, for kids and adults, animated, live action, you name it, we probably had it. Next to the cabinet was a calendar, proudly displaying the image of an eagle spreading its wings in the sunlight. My family was well known for reusing the same things year after year, and this calendar was just one of the things that we couldn't get rid of. The current date was January 22nd, with a single word written underneath.

"Departure"

I tried turning the tv on but all I got was a static screen. Apparently, it seems we didn't have cable. I distinctly remember _having_ cable but beggars can't be choosers. I opened the cabinet, hoping that maybe I could watch a movie or two before I left. As I rummaged through the rows of movie cases, Nothing particularly caught my eye, but I settled on a movie that I've kind of been ashamed to admit that I liked.

The movie itself was very good, a nice and easy to understand message at the end, memorable music and characters, jokes that were on point almost all the time. It was just the other people that viewed it that makes me a bit embarrassed to watch with someone else. If there was one thing I don't miss at all, it would be the utter depravity that some people possessed. Didn't help that the movie itself not so subtly pandered to that demographic, but I can't blame the movie makers for wanting to make a little extra money.

But… if there's no people around to see me, I guess I could watch it anyway. I opened the case, expecting to find the disc of the movie packed inside, instead there was nothing. I threw the case on the ground, frustrated that I couldn't even watch something as simple as a movie. I opened more cases, but all of them turned out to be empty. I didn't bother putting them back, there's nobody here to tell me to pick them up.

I was still alone. Even in here, in my childhood home, I was reminded of that. My home didn't mean much if nobody else was there with me. At least I have memories of my life. I don't plan on forgetting them. That's all that mattered. As long as I have them, I'll be alright.

 _If I lose them, what's the point of moving forward if I can't remember the past?_

I looked towards the stairs, where my room was. If anything, I should visit that last. I still wanted to go upstairs, so I walked on the many creaking stairs that made anything that required discretion no longer viable. I looked at the multiple picture frames strewed all across the walls, of better times long since past. Photos of me, and my family.

I opened the door to my parents bedroom, and nothing was out of the ordinary. Their bed was still smack dab in the middle of the room, a large queen sized mattress and frame. Dressers that I will admit were a little drab and uninteresting. I moved on to the bathroom, next to my own room. As much as I want to go inside my sister's room and mess up _everything_ in it, there was no point to it.

 _Why mess with someone's stuff if they aren't even there to get angry at you?_

While we did have two bathrooms; only one could be considered a "real" bathroom. That bathroom was upstairs. Which meant that most of the time, I had to compete with my sister in a race of who could get in first _and_ lock the door. Both me and her found that part out the hard way.

I opened the bathroom door and went inside. Nothing too spectacular and nothing too glamorous for a family like us. There was the usual white sink and bathtub with equally white floor tiles. A mirror standing at attention above the sink. I took a good long look at my reflection… I didn't want to forget what I used to be.

My unkempt dirty blonde hair that went down to my neck, tired blue eyes, a linear scar going across my right cheek (One of my friends had the great idea of trying to shave me with a dirty razor, you can guess how that turned out), and a rather insignificant patch of hair on my chin.

The rest of my features were covered by my clothing, but you could tell from just looking at me that I was the definition of "skinny". Bony elbows, legs like twigs, you get the idea. Exercising was never my top priority, yet I never gained any weight.

As I ran a hand over my head of disheveled hair, I turned my attention to my room. The last place that I wanted to see. I turned the doorknob to my room, but right before I entered, I heard a strange noise that gave me a cold chill.

 **A baby was crying… in my own room.**

Whose baby is in my room?! My parents stopped having kids when I was born, so why was there a baby in my own room? I kicked open the door, making a loud bang that echoed throughout the house, the crying coming to a sudden stop. In the middle of my own room, there was a crib. A crib, with a now silent baby inside. Am I going insane? Am I imagining this right now? Is any of this even real anymore?

Apprehensively, I approached the clearly out of place toddler's bed. My eyes widened at the stark realization that this baby was not normal. It wasn't even human.

 _It's an owl…_

A tiny little white puffball of a bird was in the crib. It was so small and meek, with its eyes closed shut, I almost felt sorry for it. _Almost._ This thing, this creature… it's why I'm here. I knew it is, It _had_ to be. It made me almost die in a goddamn tree. It made me die without saying goodbye to my family.

 **It made me sick. I won't let them in my house. My home, they can't have it!**

 **It belongs to me, nobody else!**

My anger had reached to a boiling point. I grabbed it by its feeble neck, clutching it in my hands as one who hold a doll. I made sure that my grasp was not so firm as to wake the demon up from its slumber, and I cautiously walked to the window. I put it on the middle of my bed(I really hope that the washing machine still works) and I began to open the window. As if I couldn't get more frustrated, the window refused to budge. I knew my window was pretty shitty, but now was not the time. My attempts at doing this with finesse and stealth ended in failure. So I decided on "Smashing the stupid thing in with my trusty baseball bat,".

I heft the metal bat with my hands, a stylish red signature near the top. A gift from my father when I was still interested in the sport. A gift that will deliver me from grace, that will take me home.

I swing the metallic bat full force at the window, shattering the glass into dozens of pieces. I use the bat to push away the remaining shards outside, before turning to the animal in my bed. The tiny bird cries like a little monster, inhuman in sound and nature, mocking me. I clench my fists in anger before tightly grabbing the owl in my hands, the cries of the avian creature becoming more frantic, as it tries to escape from my clutches.

I hold out my arms outside the window, a two story height was more than enough to end its life, without me having to bash its brains out. I don't need its blood staining the walls of my room. Its attempts at escaping physically had finally ceased. Before I let go of the owl, its eyes opened, boring right into my very own soul.

My entire body shook like the leaves of a tree in the verdant spring breeze. Once I set down the owl in my bed, I clasped my hands to my mouth, shocked at what I had just saw. It has been said countless times throughout the ages, what you use to perceive the world around you can also give you a glimpse into the souls of others. The saying had never been more true in my life than right now, as I gazed into the dark blue pools of the night, I saw nothing more than a child.

It's not _his_ fault for taking me away from my home, my family and friends. It's not mine either.

 _ **I don't deserve this… and neither did him. I want to go home, and he shouldn't be in mine.**_

 _A dark and dreary night sky looms overhead. One could see a vehicle carrying a group of adolescents on the only road in sight. As it moves through the many twists and turns, it begins to teeter more and more off the road, veering into the wrong lane. A voice could be heard shouting over the drunken excitement of the three. A voice telling the driver to pull over, that they've had enough and wanted to go home. It didn't get its wish, and the others scoffed at its unwillingness to "let loose, and quit being a stick in the mud."_

 _Only the voice saw the oncoming truck heading straight for them. The inebriated banter of the three quickly turned to screams of terror. The driver tried to evade the truck by swerving to the right, and just barely grazed the truck, the loud honking of both of the vehicles dampened the sounds of frights as both cars drove straight into the old oak trees. All of the screams stopped, and only the repeating noise of the horn could be heard in the forest._

 _It appeared that all of the occupants in the death trap of a car, had been fatally killed in the crash. All but one of them. It was the one that wanted to go home._

 _A boy surrounded by death, misery and pain, in a sea of trees. His arm had been severely wounded from the debris, bloodied, battered and bruised from the sudden impact. Using his good arm, he carefully managed to unbuckle himself from the seat, and pushed the door open. He looked back at them, they who were now permanently silenced by death. He went outside, and instantly felt a sharp, searing pain running down all over his leg, and fell down to the ground._

 _His leg was broken…_

 _He could see that the bone was not pushing out, yet he could still feel the bone fragments tearing apart skin and muscle, like a thousand blades simultaneously stabbing themselves into him. An unbearable pain combined with the multiple cuts and bruises dotted all across his body. The cold autumn winds picked up in their intensity, almost like they were waiting for him, mocking him._

 _Gritting his teeth, he desperately tried to get back up on his feet, yet every time he did, the pain only increased more and more. He decided to crawl away from the wreckage. The unintentional man-made gravesite of three unsuspecting teenagers, who only wanted a good time._

 _Crawling to an untouched oak tree, he looked at the night sky. No moon was out, but the stars above shone brightly, piercing through the veiled darkness. Past the sounds of the car, he could hear the forest wildlife. A familiar sound of crickets endlessly chirping for their mates._

 _Then he heard something that he had never heard before in real life. Of course he had searched videos of them on the internet, but they paled in comparison to the real, unfiltered version of this lovely sounding being._

 _The sound of an owl hooting…_

 _It was such a calming song of Mother Nature, that gave him some semblance of peace from his troubles. The pain was drowned out over the unwritten songs of an owl claiming the land for their own. With a slight smile on his face, he closed his eyes, and drifted off to sleep. He wouldn't be waking up for some time… he did not hear the sounds of a pack of wolves, howling in the forest. Hungry for their next meal._

 _Unbeknownst to the roaming predators of the woods, a wanderer from another place, another world, was getting ready to fight them off. They were willing to save him from death, so that he could live to fight another day. They were willing to die for him._

 _After all… who else could save their old home, than someone who was about to leave his?_


	3. Chapter 3: An Unknown Savior

My own stupidity, my own misguided judgement almost ended the life of another. A murderer will still be a murderer no matter how many good deeds he has done, no matter where he is, no matter what or who he is.

 _I am many things, but I am no killer._

Leaving the owl behind, leaving my home behind me, I sat down on the old bench beside the door, breathlessly swinging as I waited for the darkness to return. The familiar creaking sounds of the metal chains aided in calming me down, and I slowly leaned my head back on the wooden swing. A dreamless slumber was on the horizon, but before I could reach it, an unusual sound sent me back to consciousness. I look down at the ground beneath me, and he was there, staring back at me.

Before I could say a word, he suddenly vanished without a sound, and the house was starting to crumble. My time was short here, so I left my home for the second time in my life (lives?)

My heart had came back to accompany me on my journey to consciousness, and we went onwards to the darkness. Senses, one by one, joined me on my adventure, but yet again, the darkness only persisted. When sound returned to me, I could hear whispers of… someone in the dark. They turned into disjointed words and phrases, and I was given little to no context to understand them.

It became clear to me that this was someone speaking about me, or perhaps to me. I wasn't too sure. I felt like absolute crap. Every breath I took felt like my last, and I was consistently sent into irritating coughing fits. Every outburst was met with a familiar voice. It was the voice that saved me. _She_ was the one who saved me. I could not begin to believe that this soothing, relaxing voice belonged to someone who wasn't a human being.

And yet, it seemed like she was not talking _to_ me. She spoke to me like how I'd speak to my baby sister when I was younger. It made sense, no rational person would immediately assume that a baby had a mind that was older than its body. I just hoped that I wouldn't be treated as a baby for long.

My thoughts were interrupted when I started to cough violently once more. It felt like I was going to retch up my own still beating heart. Almost immediately, I felt the touch of her embrace, and she reassured me that everything would be alright. The coughing didn't relent, so sadly she had to leave me alone, even for only a few seconds.

It sounded like she wasn't speaking to me now, she was kinda talking to herself now. That was fine, as long as she left me to get something, which she probably was. I would do anything and everything to get rid of this very irritating and annoying cough. I heard her quickly come back to me, and told me something that worried me deeply. She said that she was sorry, but she had to do it to make the coughing stop.

The searing pain across my chest was like the fires themselves had finally caught me. My infantile screeching screams of pain terrified both me and anyone else nearby who could hear me. I heard her trying to calm me down, but I didn't care. The pain was too much, and I was on the brink of passing out.

When the pain subsided, I was relieved to find out that whatever she had used had indeed cured me, I no longer had the urge to cough, and while I was upset that she had put me in that amount of pain, I was still grateful.

"There you go child, you can now rest easy now that that's over with. You must be parched after all that, let me get some fresh water for you to drink. I'll be right back."

The sound of her wings beating signaled that she had left me. I figured that before she came back, I might as well look around. I opened my eyes, I was inside another tree and As I looked around, I noticed a few things that were _very_ out of place, like why the hell do you have this, get rid of it immediately kind of things.

It wasn't garbage per say, but it shouldn't really be in a tree. To my left there was a small pile of plain old silver utensils, like forks, spoons and knives resting on one of the walls of the tree, and to my right there was another pile of… Change? Pocket change that ranged from pennies to quarters, all arranged in neat little towers. There was even an old-school small burgundy rug laying on the floor of the hollow.

 _Did I get saved by an owl whose a hoarder of human stuff?_

I took a gander behind me, before I slowly realized that I had just done something that ordinarily would have physically impossible as a human, but since I'm not one anymore, was now normal. At least, for an owl. For me, the motion was strangely fluid and uncanny.

What was behind me was a well-crafted and fancy silver handheld mirror. How such a thing that wasn't tarnished at all in this world remained a mystery to me. My own reflection was staring right back at me, my _owl_ reflection, that is.

Past the mirror was a short entryway going deeper into the tree.

The clearly recognizable facial disk that was shaped like a heart I now possessed, meant that I was a barn owl. One of the more popular owls back home, and for good reason. They were always represented as elegant and graceful creatures in books and movies alike. I had a fluffy looking coat of feathers which were covered in soot and ash, no doubt from the fire, and my beak had shared the same fate. I made a few experimental motions to get a feel for them. I moved my stubby little wings up and down, left and right, almost like I was waving at my own reflection. I wriggled my tiny toes, noting the absence of one toe in the front, and the addition of another behind my feet. Or should I say talons, I'm still not sure.

Speaking of my reflection, one thing that weirded me out was my eyes. They weren't black as coals like any other barn owl, rather they were the same color when I was human, blue.

 _ **The same color as that owl in the crib…**_ _and the only part of my humanity that people can see is my eyes, if only they could see past their appearance._

 _Maybe that's for the best…_

I heard the sounds of wings beating, moving closer to me. Probably her, but I'm astounded that my new ears could pick up the most subtle sounds of movement, even from a long distance.

She arrived just as I was going to get up from the bed, and in one of her talons was a… peanut? Some kind of nut shaped object, I have no idea how water could even fit inside a nut, while not leaking in the slightest, but whatever. Anything to get rid of this dry throat would do. I eagerly awaited my "cup" of water, and it seemed like she was going to give me it. However, it appeared that she had something else in mind. As in, telling me to open my mouth up, bending my neck upwards, and _then_ drinking the water. After I finished downing the last droplets of water, she set down the nut next to one of her many human collections.

"Figured you'd be thirsty after all that you've been through. I would have been quicker if I also wasn't parched after saving you." She said, making an odd owl sound that mimicked laughter at the end.

 _So this is my savior in all her glory..._

Her height would have been negligible if I was a human, but now it looked like she towered over me, although she didn't exactly look scary. If I was an actual baby, I might've cowered in fear over such an imposing figure. I won't lie, I still internally did, even if I concealed it well enough on the outside. Her two tufts of feathers that imitated ears on top of her head, with her amber eyes, gave me a rough idea of what she her species was. I can't recall the exact name, but that didn't matter too much. I'm not sure if the human name still applies here.

She came closer to me, inspecting me intently. Was she trying to find something on me? Or was she interested in something else? I cocked my head to the right, not sure what she was planning.

"Yuck," she said with undeniable disgust present in her voice. "Just look at your feathers! A tyto should never look unclean in front of others. It's not proper for your kind."

I guess she didn't get the memo that children aren't usually known for their cleanliness, but I will admit that I was in dire need of a good bath, or perhaps a shower, I wouldn't be surprised if she DID have one somewhere in here.

My savior then randomly decided to pick and prod me damn near everywhere using her own beak. Apparently my definition of hygiene and proper cleaning methods were drastically different than hers. I should have expected that, yet I'm still sort of surprised that there are no shower heads or sinks at all, heck I would be fine with a wet rag! Why doesn't she have one in this hollow of human antiques?

While I was definitely weirded out by this odd method of cleaning someone, it wasn't painful, nor was she forceful or aggressive. As she continued plucking off the soot and ash from my poofy feathers, I had a rather interesting question that came to my mind.

 _Will I have to do this by myself?_

After what felt like hours of her methodically and carefully retrieving the products of the fire resting within my feathers, she finally stopped with a pleased look on her face, as she smiled with satisfaction of her work.

"There we are, much better now. Now, I'm assuming that you must be starving, and it just so happens that I have the right thing for you." She said, while scanning the room in search of food for me to eat.

 _What is she even looking for?_ Unless there's a hidden stash of baby food tucked away inside one of her collections, I don't think she'll find anything. Unfortunately, I was wrong, so _so very_ wrong.

My eyes weren't affixed to my skull like other owls back home, as I could move them about freely without any hassle. Another trait from my humanity that had emerged, but not an unwelcome one. And in the corner of my eye, I saw her catch something in her talons. A wriggly, creepy crawly thing that I absolutely despised growing up. A caterpillar who was caught at the wrong time, in the wrong place. She crept up towards me, stopping dead in front of me, and held out the horrible critter right in front of my face, dangling it like it was a gummy worm.

"Nothing wrong with a nice little meal from yours truly, now open your mouth and say Aah."

I did indeed say Aah, but I think screaming in absolute terror wasn't what she expected from me.


	4. Chapter 4: New discoveries

_Chapter 4: New discoveries_

 _A young boy wanders throughout the emptiness of darkness. Stranded, all by his lonesome. His thoughts were the only things that could have been spoken, yet only he could hear them._

 _It's so cold…. so lonely… This place is so scary, I don't want to be here anymore. Where is everyone? Where did they go?_

 _Please, I just wanna go home… somebody, anybody?_

At least I can scratch off "Eat a bug and try not to puke" on my bucket list. Can't say that I complied too well with eating something without any teeth to mash it up at all, but at least it's over with. Though I can still feel it moving down my throat, which almost made me regurgitate it right back up. Ugh, even the image of a puked-up half-digested centipede makes me incredibly nauseous.

I do have to say that her reaction was pretty freaking priceless and unforgettable (owls with facial expressions, who would've thought?). She honestly believed that as soon as I managed to swallow her "meal" whole, she thought that I was choking on it. Note to self, never let someone perform an impromptu Heimlich maneuver when you aren't actually choking on something. I may have appeared to be choking but in reality I was just gagging uncontrollably for longer than what was appropriate.

Thankfully, once she realized that I wasn't in any serious danger, she stopped her senseless actions and instead, she showered me with a lot of choice words (most of them I had no idea what they really meant) in rapid succession but she never physically harmed in me in anyway. I don't think that I could've withstanded a barrage of attacks from someone who was twice or more times my height.

There was an air of awkwardness inside the hollow, and the silence quickly grew deafening, until she broke it with an apology. If only she knew who I really was but kudos for her attempting to remedy our newfound relationship, no matter what level of intelligence she thought I possessed at the time. It's the thought that counts, my mother used to say.

Behind where she was, I could see the sun's rays starting to rain down upon the world. She tiredly yawned to herself before tucking me in for a good… day's sleep. I am all for sleeping in, but my insatiable curiosity got the better of me, so I merely pretended to sleep until it looked like she was down for the count, taking notice of when it appeared that she might've awoken from her slumber. Luckily for me, it seemed that my savior was quite the heavy sleeper.

I've snuck around my home dozens upon dozens of times so I was somewhat experienced with being discreet. The sleep schedule may have been reversed but the methods were the same. Don't make any sudden movements, be as quick and quiet as you possibly can, and hope that whoever you're sneaking by, doesn't wake up. Also, make sure what you're sneaking around on isn't loud when stepped on. I had to learn that part the hard way, but I figured that it was worth it. It wasn't like my mother or father was going to kill me or anything. Not too sure what _she_ will do to me if I get caught.

 _Maybe she'll stuff down more disgusting creatures into my mouth and karate chop my neck when they get stuck in my throat._

My body wasn't responding too well with my commands; I basically had to lay down on the ground,and pretend that I was a snake. I kept moving forward at a snail's pace, going deeper inside the hollow. When I reached the end of this unorthodox natural hallway, and used my underdeveloped leg muscles to shakily stand up, my mouth gaped open in awe at what awaited me.

Rows upon rows, towers upon towers of books littered everywhere. I tried to read a few of the titles of them but they were written in a foreign language that I could not understand at all. Whoever my savior was, she sure did like to collect things. At least she isn't hoarding stupid stuff like souvenirs from gift shops or other more, _questionable_ items. I grabbed one of the books nearest to me and opened it using both my beak and my two wings (Do you really think that owls have great upper body strength, let alone a child? I know I don't, you must be joking right?) and with some difficulty, I flipped through some of the faded and worn out pages, I searched for pictures or drawings, because they were way easier to understand than this chicken-scratch gobbledegook.

What I found within the book was… unsettling. The first few drawings were these detailed illustrations of creatures that I thought I was familiar with back home, but they were heavily distorted and downright creepy. On one page, there was a gloomy landscape shot of a dark forest, with a flock of black crows flying overhead ominously. On another, was a group of shimmering armored owls completely surrounded by another, far larger group of owls wearing darkened armor, maybe it was some form of iron or steel. I stopped at a page of a depiction of a battle between two owls.

The first owl was wearing some sort of gilded golden helmet on top of his head, wielding a pair of bronze or perhaps golden gauntlets on his talons. I had a growing suspicion that the author had a very strong bias for this owl, because the other owl who was currently locked in a duel with him looked straight out of a horror movie.

He was no Leatherface, or one of the many variations of Jason Voorhees, but his appearance did unnerve me. While the first owl was shown as some kind of courageous hero of old, this one was very menacing, and it almost felt like he was going to jump out from the very book itself and chop my head off with his own weapon. Similar to the hero's own weapon of choice, yet his gauntlets were a deep dark black, matching his cold metallic helmet. Even his own feathers matched the color of his armor. His battle-scarred face funnily reminded me of an avatar in a video game with every kind of facial injury put on one side of their face. (Yes, I have done this a bunch of times and every time I did, I laughed out loud with my friends as they interacted with the many npcs that were scattered about in the world )

I searched through a few more pages in the book, stopping at an image of the conclusion between the two. The hero had successfully defeated the black owl, and he was forced to fly away and retreat from the battlefield. The next page was almost solely comprised of the victors posing epically in the bright moonlight. If I didn't know any better, I would have thought that it was an album cover for a band.

 _What would the band name be, Owls and Glory? Maybe Breaking Birds? Hoo Fighters?_

I skimmed through the rest of the book, hoping to find more drawings. When I reached the last of the pages, I was surprised by what I saw, because who ever drew this must have been drenched with talent and perspiration when they created this pleasantly simple yet beautiful portrait. It was a huge, and I mean _huge_ tree situated on an island in the middle of nowhere. I didn't even know trees could grow that big! Was it even real, like someone could actually go there and see it for themselves? Where would one even begin to find it in this world?

I was too engrossed in my revere to recognize the sounds of someone approaching me from behind. They stopped nearly inches away from me. Fearing that I've just been caught sneaking around while she was sleeping, I slowly turned my neck towards her, but it wasn't her at all. Not even close.

Oh no, anybody but _him_.

His presence here could only mean that he had left my home, and had somehow managed to track me down to this single tree in a forest of many. Now that he is here, standing right in front of my very own eyes, I could only feel regret for the way I had treated him. When I peered into those two orbs of darkened blue, I just wanted to know what he was thinking. What kinds of things that were racing in his young, undeveloped mind.

 _Does he remember me at all? What I did to him?_

Our words were unspoken, and no one except ourselves could have known them. An exchange between two souls who couldn't understand each other, one that would've delved deep inside our brains, never to be forgotten had occurred in that moment. Before he left me alone once again he finally spoke his first words. Whether they were addressed towards me or not did not matter. He had asked them with an reverberating echo in his voice that gave me a chill running down my spine.

" **Who am I?"**

I've never been so stumped in my life, all those quizzes and tests at school, all the questions I've gotten over all these years from all these different individuals, they were nothing compared to this. For once in my life, I don't have an answer for someone who needed it the most.

 _Another thing that I'll have to apologize for._

Without another word, he effortlessly moved away from me, heading towards the hollows entrance. As quick as I could without alerting the sleeping giant, I tried to follow him, but I was nowhere near as fast as he was. Using my entire body to move like some sort of bug-bird hybrid instead of taking advantage of my own two feet was definitely NOT working in the slightest when it came down to speed. I tilted my head up, and I saw him… floating? That's not physically possible at all, yet here he was, hovering right above the forest floor like a character from an old anime cartoon (you know who I'm talking about).

He twisted his neck backwards with a sudden swiftness that would have surely broken every single bone in it, had he been a human, yet there was no sickening crunch or snap to be heard. His lower body remained completely still, facing away from me lifelessly as his eyes gazed into my soul.

 _His eyes…_

They weren't looking through me anymore. No, they were looking AT me. _He_ was staring at me with those unnatural blue eyes that mirrored my own.

" **Who are you?"**

You know that feeling where your heart just completely stops for a moment, and your chest hurts painfully for a split second? I felt that, tenfold. An intangible force pushed him down hard on the nonexistent ground he had been standing on with a loud thud. This was way too depressing for me to let out any form of laughter. I disliked seeing children getting hurt for no reason, and I wanted to help him up. A child, whoever or whatever they were, did not deserve to be in pain with nobody there to be with them.

 _I only wish that he'll forgive me if he ever finds out the truth about me and what I had done to him._

" **Help me, please…"** He was edging closer to me, moving through the air like a phantom.

Before he could reach me, something from up above the trees caused us both to turn into statues. It was a large bird, maybe the same size as my savior, but it probably wasn't friendly. I knew that I had to go back in but my body wouldn't respond to my commands. The owl quickly disappeared without a trace, leaving me all alone.

The bird swooped down from his perch, diving straight towards me. I tried everything, to call for help, to run away, yet nothing worked. He held out his talons, and in one fluid motion, yanked me straight out of my "home". He clutched me tightly, and I was once again fearful for my life.

Great, I've just been kidnapped by a criminal avian, that's terrific. A _very_ tiny positive from this sudden encounter was how it held me in their talons. There was no way to see the ground below me, and even if there was, like hell I'd do that. I don't need motion sickness on top of this.

The creature continued to fly below the trees in the dim sunlight, and I wondered why it refused the opportunity to go above the forest. My question was soon answered by the calls of another, more conspicuous bird. A group of crows were circling around the sky, and they didn't look friendly at all. I think whoever took me knew that it would be too dangerous to fight all of them, what with me in his talons. Who knows, maybe he'll drop me to tear out their throats?

Since there wasn't anything else to do, I closed my eyes, and imagined that I was back home with my family. Playing that new video game with my brother who always wanted it for Christmas, running around in the fields with my dog, jumping on trampolines, admiring the beautiful shades of green in a park. It cooled my nerves for a time, and before I knew it, the bird's flight was coming to an end.

 _Attention, our one and only passenger. This is the captain speaking, we are pleased to say that your arrival at the institute for child slavery was a fast and efficient one. We hope that you'll choose United (childnapper) Airlines for all of your prepubescent needs._

Let me just say that in hindsight, there's only two things you could possibly do with a child when you tear them away from their home. You either brutally murder/rape them, or you put them to work in an undisclosed location for the end of time. I don't know if I should be grateful that the second one happened to me, or outraged that they should have just killed me. When it released me from its talons, it spoke to me in a cold, commanding tone.

"Listen little tyto, whatever happens to you is of no consequence to me, all that you need to know is that there's a potential for greatness that awaits you here. You'd be wise to heed my instructions, and form up with the others." He, as his masculine voice informed me, gave me a rough push away from him.

I started walking away from him, and even my bruised legs could not refuse the opportunity to keep my head from rolling off my shoulders. The pain was nothing, if not annoying anyway. As I look around, I see rock walls surrounding me, and judging by how claustrophobic the atmosphere was, I could tell that I was in some sort of canyon. I met up with the swathes of other children worriedly heading to their destination. I followed a big unwilling parade of poofy owls, unsure of their futures.

To keep us from going off the beaten path, there were small groups of full grown owls "guiding" us to wherever they wanted us to go. I even managed to piss one off, just for the sake of curiosity, mind you, and he was absolutely miffed. To keep my spirits high, I started asking him dumb kid questions, like "Who are you mister?" And "Do you know where the bathroom is?". That second one went over his head, but I still ticked him off good with five more.

Apparently, so good that he requested for someone else to take his place, and have them specifically watch me. I know, my mouth (beak) will be the death of me. With no other choice, I followed the group into a small clearing, with dozens of guards standing by above us. A large grey owl with blood red markings on his face had silenced us all.

"Your parents and family have abandoned you, so from now on you'll be classified as orphans," He spoke to us, and the second he stopped, waves of emotional upheaval were beset upon him. There must have been hundreds of these so called orphans, all crying out for reassurance, denying that their loved ones would ever do such a thing. If I didn't know any better, I'd feel sorry for him. He shot daggers at us, demanding that we be quiet until the end of his speech.

"Horribly tragic, I know. But by the mercy of Glaux, you've been rescued and brought here to St. Aegolius. And, in time, you'll come to be grateful for the kindness shown to you. You'll repay that kindness with labor. Some of you will be pickers…"

 _Fuck my life and everyone in it, I'm actually stuck in some owl concentration camp?!_

A lone owlet vocally shared his differing opinion, much to the dismay of the other watchman. Surprisingly, he continued speaking, although still visibly bitter about the interruptions.

"Some will be soldiers. In your own ways, all shall serve the High Tyto and the Pure Ones," He finished, and as soon as he was done talking, everyone started to either ask questions or deny the thought of becoming something that they rightfully shouldn't become. Even his commands to silence others went unheard, until _she_ came along.

An exceptionally bright white barn owl landed in the crowd with the grace of a swan, and the style of an figure skater who'd just nailed their pirouette. She spoke in a calming, almost soothing manner to us.

"I am Nyra, Ablah General of St Aegolius, and mate to the Lord High Tyto. I know right now you miss your families, but soon enough you will understand that the Pure Ones are your new family," Her honeyed words disguised her true intentions from most of us, but of course I knew what she really wanted.

 _She wanted obedient soldiers and slaves, cannon fodder, fuel for the fire._

A brave, or possibly foolish/naive tiny owlet stood up to her, demanding that she let us all go, and was accompanied by another, taller barn owl, in agreement with their words. Miss Sunshine and Rainbows was having none of that shit though, contempt lacing her voice on every corner.

"What's this? Tyto, don't waste your time. Don't soil your feathers."

In an act of defiance, the young barn owl adamantly defended his friend.

"You leave her be!"

I could only watch as she viciously tore into the kid piece by piece, and you know what the worst part was? If I was already on their naughty list, I don't think I'll come out of this place alive if I also shared my personal opinion to her, and I still enjoyed the thought of living.

"Oh, a spirited little Tyto, how touching. You and your patch of felt will stay together then, as pickers. Perhaps when you remember your nobility, Tyto, we can make a soldier out of you."

And that, was when he asked about his brother named Kludd. Strange name, but in a place like this everything was. When she asked his brother if he was willing to join him, he silently declined, turning away from his own blood. I couldn't really blame him, who'd want to be an actual slave when you could be a figurative one? The lesser of two evils, surely, but it was still a total dick move.

Once the queen and her guards corralled the ones willing to become soldiers for her army, I, along with many others, were forced to become "pickers". Two horned brown owls took us along to an alcove, the moon's radiant beams of light shining down upon the barren landscape.

"So tonight, " the first one began. " we want you to… what was it again Jatt?"

"To rest," the second one now known as Jatt answered, and I could surmise that these guys weren't exactly the sharpest tool in the shed (I'm glad that that awful song doesn't exist here)

"To rest. So lean back, put your beaks up, and turn your faces to the glorious full moon."

"And sleep," the two said in perfect synchronization.

I quickly assumed the position, not wanting to cause any more trouble for the day. Sleep would have come easily to me, had I possessed a bed with a warm blanket. Sleeping on the cold hard ground was not comfortable… at all.

"Hey you, what's your name?" An unknown voice whispered to the right of me. I subtly look over to my right to see another owlet with brown feathers and ear tufts.

"Uh, I'm Alex, what about you?" I quietly said to the kid, before quickly feigning slumber for the roaming owls periodically checking on everyone.

"Matthias... I wanted to ask you something." He murmured in a somber tone.

"What do you want dude, we don't have all night to stay up and chat, you know." I muttered sarcastically to him, yet my wondrous charm was ignored.

"Will you be my friend?" His innocence, while dangerous to have in a place like this, gave me a sense of real hope for the future. How could I refuse to that question? Who knows what will happen tomorrow?

"Sure Mat, I'll be your friend. Now go get some sleep, I get the feeling we'll need it." I whisper back to him, and he understood, falling fast asleep. As I gaze up at the moon for one last time, I wonder why they wanted us to sleep underneath its rayes of pure light.

Come tomorrow, I would find out the truth, and it wasn't pretty…


	5. Chapter 5: New Friends

Chapter 5: New Friends

 **I hope you will eventually like the new OC'S I made for this fanfic, and I also hope that everyone isn't totally out of character, even if I did tweak a few things here and there. I'll be uploading two more parts today, and maybe a few more during the week. (I know, shocker for someone who is a major freaking procrastinator, right?) Also, please tell me if I misspelled Matthias's name, it's not supposed to be Mattias, at least I think it shouldn't be.**

 **Anyways, let's get the show on the road. And for anybody who is reading this right now, have a good day.**

 **Sepsis for the win!**

In the dreamscape of my mind, I was standing in the middle of a familiar quiet park, the one I always went to with my family in the summer. The verdant green trees, the worn cobblestone pathways, the grills for cooking tasty burgers and hotdogs, and the lush wavy grass were a welcome sight to see, compared to the compressed canyon with absolutely nothing even remotely beautiful inside it. I'm willing to bet that the only thing that was would have been was that lovely white barn owl married to the "almighty" High Tyto, whatever that means.

I was a good old regular human here, which was comforting for me. Just remembering what it was like to be one isn't good enough for me. so it's nice for my subconscious or whoever makes my dreams to have the decency to make me, well me. Although now that I think about, my dreams back when I was still a human usually didn't make a lick of sense, and I'd always forget about them whenever I woke up. Maybe the whole dying and reincarnating into an owl helped to quell the insanity of my dreams.

I sat down on one of the sturdy wooden benches, trying to listen to any sounds of the forest. I had no such luck in hearing anything nature wise, but I did hear the sound of something small approaching me.

 _Why wouldn't_ _ **he**_ _be here?_

The owl without an identity walked up to me, looking straight at me with his blue eyes, even doing a typical turning of the head in confusion that many animals did. Wonder what he wants to say to me?

" **You know, you never really told me why you tried to kill me."** He deadpanned, although still containing a bit of childlike curiosity, and he had a bit of an English accent in his speech. I think that now that we're all alone, It's time to make amends with the little guy.

"Let me say that I feel like shi- uh, crap for trying to do that to you, and I wanted to apologize for my behavior. I know my word probably doesn't mean squat to you, but I just want you to know that I made a terrible decision and you should probably hate me for it."

" **Why would I hate you for it? I don't know a lot, but I do know that you aren't always like that, I think you're better than what you think you are right now!"**

Well this is surprising, the little tyke knows his way with words. At least he understands that I'm not a deranged child killer.

"Okay, let's just pretend that nothing ever happened between us, and this is our first time talking to each other, Alright?" I asked to him, and he nodded in agreement.

"Good… it's nice to meet you, my name is Alex, what about you?" My words left my mouth even after I realized how stupid I was. The kid _has_ no name.

" **Well, I don't really have one, maybe you could give me one?"** He looked at me with pleading eyes, and I immediately started running down a list of possible names for the owl. After a little bit of time had passed, I found a good name for the little guy.

"How about… Daniel?" I ask him, and his face almost beamed in excitement.

" **I like it! My name is Daniel, for your information. It's a pleasure to greet you Alex**." He says, forming a wide grin in happiness. It's nice to know that he didn't hold a grudge on me, but honestly, now that he was talking to me like an intelligent, but still quite a young child, it also made me smirk in satisfaction. I aim to please, so long as you're not trying to enslave me or anything of that nature. If I can help just one person deal with their problems, than that's more than whatever I could ask for in this life.

" **So, can I tell you what might happen to you and your friend?"** Wait a second, how does he know about Matthias? I didn't see him whenever we arrived at the happy fun place for not-orphans, so where was he?

"How do you know about Matthias?" I curiously questioned, and his smile started to slowly fade.

" **I don't know how or why, but sometimes I can see and hear what you do when you're awake. I'm sorry for, ummm, invading your privacy like that. I just want to hopefully answer your question about why you and the others slept under the full moon."** That's a little bit on the disturbing side, but I'm glad it's Daniel and probably only Daniel who can do this and not you know, basically anyone else in the world. He apologized, so that was good enough for me. I did want answers, so I gestured to let him continue.

" **Okay, so while my memory is very limited, I do remember bits and pieces of your parents, before they decided to flat out abandon you for seemingly no reason. They heard a rumor that was spread around the forest that originally came from a place called the Kuneer Desert. It said that if an owl were to suddenly collapse from a lack of sleep, they'd wake up… wrong."**

"What do you mean, wrong?" I asked, becoming worried for both my safety and Matthias's in the waking world.

" **They didn't specify what exactly went wrong with the owl who woke up from their slumber, and frankly I don't have any ideas right now, so I think I'll let you try to guess what could have happened to them."**

This was troubling, it could be literally anything remotely bad for an owl. It could be a sudden lack of perception, the nerves in the wings could become disabled, brain cells might die off from extended exposure to the moon, _anything_.

"Daniel, would you know if I come out wrong when I wake up tomorrow?"

" **Alex, as much as I want to say yes, there's just not enough for me to go on. You'll just have to find that out for yourself when you leave here. But I think that's enough smart talk for now, so I'm going to take a nice nap, I'll see you later, okay?"** It only took him roughly five seconds to go from happy peppy smart kid to passed out on the stone pathway sound asleep kid. I gently picked him up from the ground, and held him close to my chest. It's weird hearing the vernacular of an adult come out a child, maybe next time I'll ask Daniel how he learned to speak fluent English so quickly. I too, felt tired after our conversation, and as my eyes grew heavy, I had one last final thought before I left the dream world.

 _How the hell can you sleep in a dream?_

 _ **So many voices congregate into only sound, dozens of the unfortunate unconscious children rise up, yet their bodies remained, stuck to the ground. All I can hear are the cries of the forlorn, but there is still hope. He and his friend, along with two others, did not depart. I see their bodies breath steadily, and well.**_

 _ **Alex, I'd advise you to leave as soon as you can. Nothing good can come from this place, except for a swift death at the talons of your fellow species, or the death of your soul.**_

When I woke up, my back was screeching in pain from how uncomfortable I lied on that one rock. My eyes witnessed the blindingly hot ball of exploding Hydrogen, and if I was still human, I think my eyeballs might have melted from the sun's bright light. I instinctively turned my head away, and looked at Matthias, who was still sleeping. The owls surveying us from last night must have left to get some shuteye, and I assume we were to get up in the morning. I nudge Matt lightly, and he tiredly opened his eyes, quietly yawning to himself.

"Is it time to eat my tweener yet Mum? I'm ab-solute-ly starving."

"Matthias, I'm not your mother, and I don't know what that means." His expression turned from a sleepy state of confusion, to a sudden realization at where he was. Couldn't blame him for thinking this was all a nightmare, but I'm afraid that it wasn't true. His small frame started to shudder in anxiety, and I stood up and inched my way to him.

" Alex, I wanna go home… These owls are real jerks, and I don't wanna sleep on the ground anymore, and I wanna-" With my new "arms", I envelop him in a calming embrace. He gasps in shock, before quickly melting into my wings.

"You're alright, nobody's gonna hurt you, I promise. Everything's gonna be fine." I reassure him, and his shaking slows down, but before I could hold him any longer, two more Pure Ones were suspiciously staring straight at us, getting ever so closer. I broke away from him, and soon after, Beavus and Butthead rudely interjected with their unbelievable daftness.

 _How do these assholes have a role here that isn't "be shot from a cannon at the enemy as an impromptu bullet"?_

" Alright, my lovely little owlets, that's enough beauty sleep. Wakey wakey, rise and shine. It's another glorious day!" Oh good, barely inconspicuous sarcasm, that's my job dingus, not yours. At least let me have that! Before we inevitably were sent to work in the mines for all eternity, I saw the faces of the other owlets, and I was stunned at what I gazed upon.

Their eyes were like dark marble, and when you looked straight into those eyes, there were no signs of a soul behind them. Even their movements were unnatural and robotic. This must have been what they wanted, they didn't even fucking _bother_ to indoctrinate us into their ranks. The moon did it _for_ them.

"Matthias, listen to me very carefully. We have to act like everyone else, okay? Don't talk to me unless you think there's nobody watching us. Got it?" I whispered to him, and he made a slight nod. We walked like the empty husks of a child like they wanted us to be, and they were none the wiser. I mean, I sincerely hope so. The Pure Ones taking us to another part of their five star orphanage yelled out some rather coarse and demeaning commands.

"Keep moving maggots!"

"Shuffle those talons!"

"We don't like dawdling, anything with W's we don't trust."

I had half a mind to ask that last one the biggest W question ever, but there was no time for mocking my captors. I could always do that later. Ahead of us, Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum were giving an introduction to this new place, this "Pelletorium" that they called. I wish my savior told me that a pellet was the owl equivalent of both vomit and crap made into a little cute ball form.

Somewhere to my right, in my peripheral, Matthias was starting to have second thoughts about literally digging up fecal matter with his own mouth, but another glance at the many bad owls looking at us all gave him the incentive to keep going.

 _Maybe it would have been better if we did lose our minds._

"Eureka!" Exclaimed the first dummy.

"Great job number 857, whatever…" the second dummy was falsely grateful for another unnamed owlet. They apparently picked up a unique pellet with something strange inside of it.

" Alright everyone, gather round. Hey you, with the blank expression." Dunderhead McGee said.

"Don't you mean all of them?" The knucklehead rhetorically asked.

"Now this is the kind of pellet you're picking for. Mouse fur, mouse bones, that's all standard."

"But the secret rare ingredient in this one is what Mr. Mouse ate, a metal fleck."

"Metal fleck."

"Now I'm very perceptive." Which was invariably a total lie, if he can't realize that there were still unbrainwashed children amongst the soulless.

"He is." _He's not…_

"I am, and I'm detecting you…"

"Nicely done."

The first one points to the young barn owl whose brother's name I cannot remember, Club, Fudd, whatever. It appeared that he and his friend knew the dangers of the moon beforehand, and also pretended to be dead inside and out.

"...Want to volunteer to take this fleck to where all the flecks belong!"

He crudely handed the owl the mysterious blue ball, pushing him to an out of place, sinister glowing depository for all of them. His little Pygmy friend looked on in morbid horror and fascination with their golden yellow eyes, as he hesitantly walked up to it. As he got closer, the fleck gave off a blue aura that was being absorbed by this thing. It seemed like it was forcefully pulling him closer to it, and I could faintly see a bat crawl up to him, and grabbed the fleck from his beak.

"Haha, Alright, there's plenty more baskets to fill, get back to work everyone!"

His friend hurriedly approached him, asking what happened. He was correct in his assumption that these owls were planning something atrocious, and through their conversation, I learned both of their names, the small one was named Gylfie, and he was called Soren. Me and Matthias met up with the only other two conscious pickers, hopefully I could rely on them for some much needed support. Before we could give proper introductions, the same grey owl with red markings on his face drew near us.

"What exactly do you four think you're doing, eh?" He callously inquired, and like a light switch that had been turned on in Matthias's brain, he started to quiver in fear. I stood next to my friend, shrouding a wing over him. The owl ordered us to come with him, probably to inform his higher ups of our free will.

We had no idea where exactly he was taking us, since none of the Pure Ones were around, yet we were all deeply concerned for our lives.

"What do you plan on doing to us?!" Soren pleaded, but his temper arose once more.

"Quiet!" He harshly hushed him, and Gylfie decided to add in her two cents.

"You know, the Pure Ones won't be too happy if they find out you didn't let us get into the Pelletorium."

"No, and they won't be too happy when they find out what I'm going to do to you all either…." He paused for a moment, and we could not have anticipated what he said next.

"I'm going to teach you how to fly."

"Fly?" Soren asked incredulously, befuddled at why a Pure One would bother to teach slaves to soar in the sky.

"You can all breathe now," He snidely smirked at us. "It's getting really bad here, and I told myself that if anyone came that was smart, and brave enough to resist, I'd help them. Looks like you four will have to do."

 _Good, anything that can get us out of here faster, the better. I Wonder, why he would willingly put his own life on the line to save us?_

Soren also wanted to know why a Pure One would feel the need to teach owlets to fly.

"Aren't you a-" He was cut off by the owl, forming a scowl that was directed not at us, but his own superiors.

"A Pure One? No, I hate 'em. Almost as much as I hate what they've turned me into. My feathers weren't always stained with these colors." He continued, with a certain kind of sadness seeping through his words.

"When the Pure Ones invaded our kingdom, I fought back. Now, they thought they could use that... so they took my family. And they promised me if I followed orders, no harm would come to them." Maybe my eyes were fooling me, but I thought for a second that there was a gleam in his eyes, tears perhaps?

"I've been doing their dirty work ever since," He finished his heartfelt story, and moved on to the more pressing matter at hand.

"Now, have any of you ever flew before?" He questioned, and while Soren said that he was "branching", whatever that meant, it seemed like none of us ever truly used our wings like how they were meant to be utilized.

"Does the flight from my home to here count?" I mordantly asked, and he chuckled for a second.

"No, and judging by that answer, I'll assume that you've never left your hollow before, have you? No matter, all of you have no luxury of swinging through branch to branch. We need to work on your power skills, starting with what you already know. It's time to show me what you can do!"

Soren and Gylfie went first, furiously flapping their wings up and down, desperately trying to remain in the air. Matthias was starting to shake in anxiety once more, but I quickly assured him that he didn't have to be afraid.

"Matt, I know this will be difficult for you, but it's going to be the same for all of us. Don't you want to leave this place and see your mother again?" He suddenly peeped up in attention, his shaking stopped, and he had an unusual, but welcome determined look in his eyes.

"Thanks Alex, I'm glad I can count on you to cheer me up." He smiled sweetly to me, and before we could begin practicing, we were stunned by the sight of three owls colliding with each other, and we all busted out in hearty laughter. It's nice to see that even in this hellhole of misery and woe, kids can still be kids.

"Alright, you two, it's time to get back to practice," He then looked over at me and Matt, "you're not going to get out of here gawking at us, come over here and join us."

While the thought of truly flying above the clouds scared me still, I had to get over my fear, if not for myself, than for Matthias and the others. It was strangely thrilling, training to climb up to the heavens. It helped that this owl, who I now knew as Grimble, was a fairly good teacher. Teachers from my high school could learn a thing or two from him.

And so our schedule went like this for the next entire month at St. Aegolius, or what most Pure Ones preferred to call, St. Aggies. Every day, we were forced to pick through pellets, finding those mystical flecks with unknown power, and bringing them to literal bats from the underworld. Every day, walking around in circles chanting our number names (if we kept saying our real names in our heads, we'd forget them) for the "glory" of the Pure Ones. And like little eager beavers, we would impatiently wait for our time to practice flying with Grimble, enjoying both the lessons themselves, and the addition of another friend to talk to. To share stories with.

We were all growing up. Soren was the one we all looked to for comfort, and Gylfie usually had the answers we needed. Matthias was still a child at heart, only leaving me alone if he was forced to, and as for myself, I was starting to understand the inner workings of this new world, as well as how to be an owl. I'll never forget the time that I coughed up my own pellet in front of a guard, and then being forced to rummage through my own excretion in case my mouse ate a fleck.

 _That was the worst possible way to introduce me to the process known as "yarping."_

Daniel was a special case. The enigmatic owl inside my dreams came to know more about the world I lived in now, and I even told him what it was like to live as a human being. It was nice to have someone else know the truth without instantly writing me off as clinically insane. Daniel's power of seeing through my vision became more focused and refined. Sometimes I'd see him in the corner of my eye, and he'd wander off to other parts of the orphanage.

Daniel would relay information about what was going on behind the scenes in this place, like how some soldiers would be tasked with abducting more and more children from their homes, even going as far as to steal the unborn from their hollows, and hatching them in their "eggorium." On rare occasions, (I mean, _really_ rare) one of us would be charged with handling the birth of those unfortunate enough to be captured and sent here. It took some time, adjusting to how an owl would act in a situation like that, but I had little options. Although, and this may have been just a joke, you know, something that lightened the mood, even for just a moment in this place, but Gylfie made it abundantly clear that Soren seemed like a good father for his… kin.

 _However, he thought that only girls should be doing that._

Out of all the data given by Daniel, I felt that it was deeply disturbing to hear that Soren's brother, Kludd, was slowly becoming absorbed into the ranks of the Pure Ones. When Daniel sat by, silently watching as the young owl trained with his superiors, he distinctly recalled how he was vicious in his regimen, how much rage was in his moves. So I decided to keep that to myself; Soren doesn't need those thoughts permeating in his head.

 _If he was my brother, he'd be cast off as a lost cause almost immediately._

Our feathers were growing at a fast rate, becoming less poofy and downy to the touch. Matthias's color went from a muted brown to a vibrant mahogany. Soren's remained almost unchanged, and Gylfie's too, but as for myself, my feathers became an ethereal shade of silver. If I had a mirror, I'd say that I looked pretty decent, at least for an owl. An annoying tuft of feathers would always rest over my right eye, and pushing it over to the side never worked.

My accent had morphed into a hybrid version of English and southern American. I've had some time to ponder why everyone in this world sounded like they all came from the U.K., but I haven't formulated a decent answer yet.

Another uneventful day picking through shit for the "glorious" Pure Ones and their totally amazing leader, I couldn't wait to stretch out my wings with my friends. It was hard to remain like a "moon-blinked" owl when you have a serious case of ants in your figurative pants. I managed to stave off my overwhelming amount of energy until it was finally time to practice with everyone again.

Soren and Gylfie were almost always the first to arrive at Grimble's private academy, followed by Matthias and myself. I arrived last because It was imperative to me that I made sure that no one was tailing us, and my justifiable case of paranoia kept me on my toes. Fortunately for us, not that many Pure Ones circle around this area, but the threat of being find out was a constant source of anxiety for me.

When I entered our little pocket of sanity, Matthias bounded up towards me in barely concealed excitement.

"Alex, you ready for some more flying lessons?" He ecstatically asked me.

"You know, you don't have to wait for me to start training, right?"

"Well I don't want my friend to miss my awesome barrel rolling, I mean can you blame me?"

"Yes," I reply plainly. "I know how cool you are when you do that, you've done that ever since day four." He pouts like an eight year old who'd just been told by his mom that he wouldn't be going to Chuck E. Cheese's today.

"Let's get started, shall we?" I make an over the top extravagant gesture, beckoning him to join me in the air. He soon followed suit, while Grimble was giving instructions for Soren and Gylfie from his perch.

"No, more flap, deeper flap. The still air has no shape to use, so you'll have to compensate with your downstroke. And Matthias, please tone down the excessive maneuvers , you've already crashed into Soren and Alex three times today." Upon hearing this, Matthias grumbles under his breath, although I think only me and Soren heard what he said.

"You're such a meanie head."

Gylfie was having a hard time remaining up in the air for long periods of time, and was on the verge of giving up when Grimble gave her a nice nugget of information.

"Those wing tips have to almost meet Gylfie if you don't want to stall."

"I can't curl my feathers enough Grimble, they're too short!" She exasperatedly protested.

"They said that Lyze of Keil's wings were too short, but did that stop him? You're going to need to fly a long way to get to the Guardians." I was sorely confused at what he wanted from us, who were these Guardians? Why'd we need to go to them?

"Grimble, what are these Guardians you're talking about?" I had asked him, and both Soren and him gave me a bit of a "are you serious?" face, before Soren jumped at the opportunity to humble me.

"Alex, you don't know the Guardians?" I shook my head.

"Their proper name is The Guardians of Ga'hoole, and it's been said that they are the sworn defenders of the weak and broken, living inside a lone tree that's sits atop an island somewhere inside the Sea of Hoolemere." It sounded like Soren was a hard time fanboy, and at that point I remembered the book my savior had inside her hollow.

"It's a really big tree, right?"

"Not just any old tree Alex," Grimble cut in, " it's the tree of Ga'hoole, shrouded by ancient mists-"

"Which keeps it hidden from all but the strong of purpose and the true of heart!" Soren finishes for him.

"Exactly, now I would be more than happy to join you, but my family's still here, and I hope that I could one day free them."

Suddenly, a new, venom laced voice interrupts our conversation.

"So this is what the traitor's been doing all this time. I should have known that a Boreal Owl like yourself could not understand what we gave to you."

We all turned around to see our most beloved queen, Nyra, giving us all a wicked death stare. Surprisingly, she was accompanied by none other than Kludd himself. Soren's eyes start to fire up in hope, as he tries to convince his brother to come with us. Matthias shivers in terror, and I motion for him to get closer to me.

"Kids, go now!" Grimble breathlessly orders us, before moving in to fight the bitch from Hell. Most of us complied, moving closer to the edge of our jump off point. Soren was still vainly attempting to bring his brother back. My eye twitches, and my feathers ruffle up in anger. I was determined to not let him die from his blind naivety. He's too good for that.

"Racdrops! Soren, this frinks me the fuck off and I've had enough of it. If he didn't listen to you when you needed him the most, what makes you think he'll listen now?!" Soren's eyes widen in shock, dumbstruck by my choice of words.

"Alex, he's my brother! I can't just leave him all alone!"

While we were busy arguing with each other, Grimble's fighting skills were an even match to Nyra's, landing a few solid hits on her. He knocks her out of the air, pinning her to the ground with his talons. He looks up at Kludd, asking him the million dollar question.

"Make your choice son, do you wanna stay here in Hagsmire, or do you want to go home?"

Kludd moves his head from our group to back at Nyra multiple times, at odds with himself. She screeches for him to help, and he finally speaks up.

"I am… I am home!", and just like that, he solidified his fate. Even Grimble was surprised at his answer.

"No?"

"Come now, Grimble, would you wound your loving queen?" The she devil asks, but he instantaneously interjected.

"You were never my queen!"

Gylfie must have had enough of Soren's behavior, telling him straight up that we had to go. Grimble loses his grip due to Kludd joining in the fight, and as a last ditch effort to stave off our attackers, he throws a lantern on the floor, and flames shoot up almost halfway to the ceiling. That didn't stop the fire retardant queen, and I decided to take action, dragging Soren to the drop off, and pushing him off. Gylfie and Matthias followed, and I was second to last to escape.

"Follow the owlets, go you fools!" She commanded two other Pure Ones, giving chase to us all. Grimble brought up the rear.

"Go tell the Guardians! Go!" He yelled at us over the sounds of the screeching from the queen. I look back one last time, and I saw something that, for a split second, made me wish that I stayed dead, Nyra swooped in, giving Grimble a swift jab to his neck. He fell into the fog, and once more, there was nothing I could do to save him.

I faintly hear Soren say that he saw a way out, and when we flew inside another narrow crevice in the canyon, we were still pursued by the red eyed monster and her posse, and as the crevice narrows even further, and they started to gain up on us, we saw a light at the end of the tunnel. Time slowed down drastically, and one by one, everyone flew through that tiny hole, the gap between life and death, leading to our freedom. The battle claws of a Pure One rended my leg, causing a searing pain to run down my limb, but I made it through.

 _We_ made it…

"Come on guys, we have to keep moving! Faster, faster!" Soren shouted over to us from the front, and while Gylfie and Matthias complained, we all knew that we weren't out of the woods just yet.

After what seemed like an eternity, I looked back. My vision couldn't penetrate through the thick fog, yet I heard no signs of our pursuers following us anymore.

"Hey guys, I don't think we're being chased anymore!" I call out to them.

"Are you sure?" Gylfie apprehensively asks, and when she and the others peered behind, they understood.

"You know what guys?" Matthias looks happily at his wings flapping in the air like the little kid he was.

"What?" Soren wondered nervously.

"We're really flying! Does it feel like how you thought it would?"

"No, It feels much better! But what are we gonna do now?" Gylfie says, and Soren let out our true objective, while we fly above the clouds, the sun's beauty right in front of our eyes. It's not just about saving those kids anymore. It's not just about avenging the needless loss of a life of our only friend in Aggies. It's not about me being a human turned owl.

It's about saving everyone...

 **It's about saving the world...**

"We're going to find the Guardians of Ga'Hoole."


	6. Chapter 6: Exodus

Chapter 6: Exodus

Now that the danger of being chased had finally passed, I was really starting to feel like absolute shit. Spiritually, physically, mentally, you name it. The adrenaline rush had worn off a long time ago, and the pain in my leg was becoming extremely unpleasant. Despite how caring my friends were, I wanted to keep the injury hidden from them. I didn't want them to worry about me, not when they're literally riding on cloud nine.

"Umm, Soren?" Matthias had a worried look on his face, and I could hazard a guess at what he wanted to know.

"What Matthias?"

"Can we please stop and rest for awhile, we've been flying for hours!" I couldn't agree more with Matt, I was nearing the edge of consciousness in the air, my vision becoming blurry and unfocused.

"I know what we can do, we can hunt for food! How's that sound guys?" Soren suggested, and we unanimously voted on him for the maker of great ideas.

"I could eat an entire rabbit, and I'd still be hungry." Gylfie remarked, and Soren spotted a lonely moth resting on a blade of grass. He swooped in to catch the critter, who didn't hear a thing. Barn owls are a breed of birds that had the stealth of an assassin as well as the deadliness of one too, and Soren proved that statement true. Unlike Soren, with the gracefulness of a drunken sailor I sloppily land on the ground, my body almost mimicking a plane crash.

When I shakily stood up from the ground, suddenly, out of the depths of the ground itself a small owl popped up from the dirt. Bright green eyes flashed a look of restrained anger at Soren.

"Nice hunting Tyto, you should really be proud of yourself. With you know, catching a moth that was already caught." Oh great, looks like we have another charming individual at our hands here.

"I don't think you see the moth in my talons right now, do you?" Soren retorted, but the new owl had plenty of driftwood to burn.

"Well I don't think that your ears heard what I said just a second ago, that moth wasn't yours to begin with. I was _this_ close from getting the most important meal of the night." He uses his own talons to accentuate his supposed claim.

"Ahem." Gylfie cleared her throat, which startled the new owl.

"Oh I see what's happening, it's an ambush! I bet you didn't count on this!" He started kicking up dirt from his feet, getting some on Gylfie and Soren, much to the ire of the two. Soren's grip on the moth loosens, allowing the bug to escape while Matthias laughs in delight at the expense of his friends. That was when he noticed the presence of myself and Matt.

"Oh my Glaux, they multiplied! I'll have to put my legs into overdrive if I want to save my own hide!" He dug up even more dirt in an effort to protect himself from us. I mentally face palmed.

"Alright enough already, we didn't mean to steal your moth." Gylfie said, but Soren wasn't about to give up his prey yet.

"It wasn't _his_ moth!" The owl instantly pops his head up from his dirt hollow.

"Yes it was!"

"We're looking for a place to hide and rest, will you help us or not?" I bluntly ask him, and he croans his head to the right, confused.

"In what order, clone?"

"What do you mean? Does it really matter to you?"

"Of course it matters to me, there's a huge difference between hiding and resting. If you wanted to hide, that means that you're in terrible danger, if you wanted to rest, I'd assume your situation to be less dire." His reasoning was strangely sound for such an eccentric owl, and I'd be lying if I said that I disagreed with that sentiment.

"Listen, we need to get to the Sea of Hoolemere, do you know the way there?" Gylfie asked the owl, and he looked at us like we were crazy. _Talk about the pot calling the kettle black…_

"Four little owlets like you will never reach the sea. There's so many scary and terrifying beasts out that way."

"What do you mean, scary beasts?" Matthias squealed in fear.

"If the hawks don't make a quick bite out of you, then the buzzards will. And if the buzzards don't get you, then the dingoes will wait in the trees and as you fly by them…" All of a sudden, I felt like the entire world was revolving at a sickening speed. I had so much difficulty even keeping my eyes open. Everyone noticed my strange weariness, Soren running up to me in concern, lending his body as support for me to use.

"Our request still stands, owl. Do you, or do you not have a place to rest? Our friend doesn't look so good." Soren concluded, and thankfully, the owl agreed.

"Name's Digger, the hollow's this way." We headed off to the single tree in the area, going underneath one of its branches into his home. It was nice that I had help getting around, because my leg was damn near useless. Soren set me down on a soft patch of dirt, while I got my bearings.

"So you're going to the sea? You know what they call owls who fly towards the sea?" We were all befuddled at his question.

"Lost!" He raises his wings to the ceiling. "That's hilarious! Don't say that it wasn't funny, because it totally was." I was beginning to think that the jokes caused me more pain than my bloody probably infected leg. A droplet of water falls on his head, yet he seemed unaware of being hit with it.

"I've got another one for you guys, Alright what do you call an owl-" His second joke was cut off my the entrance of another owl coming inside the hollow. If I wasn't so tired, I'd have laughed at how it comically managed to fit inside the small hole when it was twice or maybe three times the size of it.

"Put me down this instant! This is no way to treat a lady!" A middle aged feminine voice came out of a pink snake trapped inside the owl's beak. It unceremoniously dropped the snake, which was already making me sicker to my stomach.

 _I can't handle anything that slithers anymore. Thank you, owl hoarder._

"Hey Twilight, we've got some company, uh hope you don't mind."

"Well, newcomers, I've just brought dinner, but it will not stop talking." Soren beams in excitement, running up to the snake and giving it a loving embrace.

"Mrs. P! It's been too long, you couldn't imagine what I had to go through!"

"Oh Soren, it really is you. Every day I've been looking for you and Kludd," She looks at Twilight accusingly. "And then to be taken by this monstrosity!" He didn't appreciate the coarse words of the snake.

"Monstrosity, The audacity! Digger, who are these owls and why are they talking to Dinner?"

" My name is not Dinner!"

"Sheesh, Dinner's a little bit of a you know what, if you know what I mean."

The snake audibly hisses at Twilight, shutting the large owl up. Soren spoke up from his silence to defend this "Mrs. P".

 _So is she married or…_

"She's not dinner, she's my nursemaid."

"I just hate to be driven to hiss. So unladylike." Said the undoubtedly not lady looking reptile.

"Oh, Mrs. P, these are my new friends," he gestures to us. "Matthias, Alex, and Gylfie."

"Hey, what about us?" Interposed Digger, as if surprised that a crackpot owl with a limited grasp on reality and his huge nest mate who didn't draw the line at sentience for his food would be considered "friends".

"Okay, these two are Digger and Twilight, our more _recent_ friends."

"Charmed to meet you Dinner, oh uh I mean, Mrs. P." Twilight's word recovery was completed with a gentleman's bow.

"These four are going to the Sea of Hoolemere, to find the Guardians of Ga'hoole." Digger informed P and T.

"What? No, Soren, we need to get you back home! Your parents are so worried." Mrs. P's ignorance led Soren to tell her what exactly happened to him.

"You don't understand Mrs. P, me and Kludd were kidnapped."

"Mercy!" Gasped the pink snake in shock.

"He's… still trapped in there, and I gotta find the Guardians to help save him, they're the only ones who can." I glared at Soren disapprovingly, he was still holding onto that false hope that maybe his brother wasn't a fuckwad with a superiority complex.

"I thought-" A short coughing fit interrupted my speech for a few seconds. "we were over this Soren."

"Alex, as long as I'm alive on this world, I'll get my brother back if it's the last thing I do." His determination never failed to keep himself going, which is commendable, but it was going to get him hurt or killed sooner or later.

"Ahhh, so there's an adventure afoot! Danger, intrigue, trials and tribulations, the stuff of songs." Twilight brought out a weird instrument that imitated the appearance of a guitar, maybe a ukulele.

"Oh Glaux no, not the lute, anything but the lute." Cried Digger in sheer horror.

"Such things have no effect on me… for I am a poet as much as a warrior. Now if you will…" Twilight suddenly breaks into a song, and I understood why Digger was so afraid.

Though his nursemaid tells him no  
The boy will not be tamed  
He flies off into danger  
To be battered, bruised and maimed.

"Just because you sung it doesn't mean it's a song." Digger stated.

"That poem just came to me, if you can believe it." Twilight puffed his feathers up in pride.

"I think they can believe it." Digger whispered in his ear.

"Right, well it sounds like we've got a long journey, so… Mrs. P? You know it's what Da would want."

"That's why I'm going with you!" Declared the sorta lady snake.

"What! No! Don't leave us here, you're the first souls we've seen in thirty moons." Digger got down on his knees to Soren, pleading to go with us.

"I'm not going if I hear anymore of his ridiculous owl jokes."

"They're a hoot!"

"They are certainly not."

Well, if I have to hear him play one more quote-unquote "song" I'm gonna tear my gizzard out!

"How dare you!"

In the midst of the two bickering back and forth at each other, I found it very hard to keep my eyes open. A warm liquid runs down my injured leg, and Matthias was the first to notice.

"Alex? Are you okay? Alex?!" The voices in the hollow start to become more distant, like I'm getting further and further away from everyone.

"Mrs. P! Ca… he's losing a lot of blood."

"Does anyone have… he's going to need some."

"The clone! Is he gonna…"

Darkness clouded my vision at last, no more voices could be heard. I was officially in the world of my mind, and I saw a comforting light in the distance. Going closer to the bright side, the source of the white light was a single lamppost.

When I looked down at my own body, it seemed that my attire had changed colors. My hoodie turned from a dirty ebony, to a slightly gray color. My jeans remained the same, yet when I gazed at my right hand, I noticed that on the ends of my fingers were a set of avian claws.

If I wasn't already acclimated sight of my own talons in the real world, I might have become a bit scared, worried that I was losing my human body. Honestly, all that truly matters to me with my humanity, is that I shouldn't forget where I came from, who I was, those kinds of things. The protection of my memories are important to me, but now that I'm not really alive in my old world, I can make new ones here.

 _If I die from sepsis, I'm blaming it on the hoarder for sleeping on the job._

Underneath the lamppost was a metallic green bench, and sitting on top of its left arm was Daniel, looking forlorn. He barely acknowledges my presence, half heartedly waving me over with his wing. I sat next to him, and I contemplated about the near future of our little entourage.

" **Alex,"** Daniel's sudden utterance of my name made me jump a bit. " **Do you think that I'm alive?"**

"Of course, I'm here talking to you right now, and you can walk and hear where I do when I'm awake." It was a weird question for an equally weird owl.

" **But nobody can see or hear me except for you. I can't smell the scent of a flower in bloom, I can't feel the wind coursing through my feathers when I fly in here, I can't truly do what you do."** He exhales a long sigh, and hunches back down, head facing the ground again. I make him look at me with my left hand, gently stroking the top of his head, his most vulnerable spot. Slowly, a small smile could be seen on his face.

"Does this help at all?" I inquired, and a few moments later, he replied with a chuckle.

" **You always know how to pick me up when I feeling down."**

"It's easy to cheer people up if you know what you're doing."

" **Let's talk about something else, can you give me a recap on what happened since you've escaped? I was asleep for like half of that debacle."** He questioned.

"Well, Soren still thinks that Kludd wasn't acting like an asshole and that he can magically turn his attitude around with only his hopes and dreams."

" **Uh-huh."**

"Matt's probably worried sick about me, Gylfie might be a little angry that I hid my wounds from her, and those two owls that took us in seem a little on the deranged side."

" **What about that snake?"** I shudder at the image of that thing, it was unsettling in those first few days seeing human expressions and voices coming from birds, but to see a slithery slimy pink serpent that also spoke just like any other person was a downright maddening eye opener.

"I really don't want to think about her right now, because I might wake up in a pool of my own vomit."

" **Well, how much are you willing to bet that she's gonna give you a caterpillar to eat?"**

"I should have never told you about that." He gleefully grinned at my hatred and disgust for both bugs and snakes.

" **I'm just saying that it could happen, she'll catch one in the tree and give it to you while you sleep."**

"I do NOT want to eat anything that still moves, nor will I ever _think_ about doing that."

His pained laugh echoes in the realm of dreams, and I try my best to stifle a chuckle, but I fail, as I join in his echoey laughter. It's a pleasant surprise to see that Daniel, much like everyone else I know, could act like a fully functional normal person. I hated seeing him angry or depressed, it reminded me too much of how my own brother would sometimes come back home from school and never say a word to me for the rest of the day.

We calm down after awhile, and he sinks back into my arms, preparing for his nap time that I promised to never interrupt. Before he went to sleep, he asked me something that warmed my heart, and made me smile.

" **Alex, If they do try to feed you a bug, make sure you give it to Gylfie. Maybe you could… tell her that a really nice and sweet guy wanted her to have it."**

I playfully rolled my eyes at his request, knowing just how much he had a crush on her ever since day one.

"I shall bring her the most magnificent delicacy known to owlkind, roasted centipede. How's that sound to you?"

" **Awesome…"** He said, closing his eyes in satisfaction. I lied down on the bench, and waited for my time to end in here. It felt wrong of me to not tell him what happened to Grimble, but I didn't want him to become even more forlorn. The light above me head turned off, and I could start to hear a recognizable voice in the dark.

"Get up Alex...Wake up!" I awakened just in time to see a blurry figure in front of me, preparing to deliver a good old fashioned slap to my face.

"I will legitimately, hurt you if you touch me." I sleepily slurred to the would be assailant, who turned out to be none other than Matthias himself.

"Come on sleepyhead, we've got to get moving."

"Ugh, five more minutes mom." He raised his wing again, and I pretended to not notice him.

"You asked for it." All of a sudden, a sharp stinging sensation arose from my cheek, and I immediately stood at attention.

"I'm up! I'm up! Can I punch you now?!" He smirks wryly at me, and I started to get up from my dirt bed (which was better than the rock bed I was forced to sleep on for an entire month). The pain in my leg had gotten better but Matthias offered his assistance anyway, and I gladly accepted, after I delivered a twenty percent effort strike to his sternum.

I looked around for everybody, yet me and Matthias were the only two owls still inside.

"Where is everybody?" I ask him, and his usual bubbly energy visibly deflated.

"When we got your leg fixed, I volunteered to stay behind and watch over you while the rest of us left for the journey." He huffs out of boredom, before turning back into the lovable brat I knew.

"But now that you're up, we can catch up to them!" He grabs my wing, ushering me outside the hollow.

"Owch man, do you want me to fly with only one wing?"

"If it'll get us to the tree faster, you bet!" And with that, he leaps off of the ground, and I follow suite. The pain in my now bandaged leg was still there, but I ignored its cries of anguish.

 _My mother always said that the best medicine next to laughter was exercise. No use in babying your body when you're living in the countryside picking up flowers and fireflies and falling down hills._

The moon in the night sky had already begun to sink down, yet Matt insisted that we continued forward. Our resolve to find the Guardians was great, but for him, I suppose there's another reason for him to keep going. It's not like there's a huge mystery as to why he wanted to fly farther, more like he _really_ loved being in the air. It's a liberating feeling, to be honest. My fear of flying was justified, but I always try to use my method of calming myself down in stressful situations.

When dawn eventually came, and my wings grew too heavy to lift, I convinced him to settle down for a bit. He put on his best sad face, to no effect.

"Aren't you the least bit tired?" He groaned in disappointment.

"Fine, but only for a little while, okay? They're not going to wait for us you know."

We landed on a branch of a sturdy maple tree, preparing to rest up. He edged closer to me, and I tucked him in my wing, while he nuzzled me affectionately. He draws out a long yawn, before falling asleep. _So much for all that pent up energy._ For me, I had a difficult time trying to do the same, sometimes I'd think that I heard a nearby crow, or a hoot from another owl. Not to mention all the incessant chirping from all of the day birds too.

My insomnia actually turned out to be beneficial in the end, because my astute ears picked up the sound of ragged breathing below us. I slowly slipped away from Matt, sidling over to the edge of the branch to get a better vantage point. My heart started to beat faster as I tried to locate the source of the strange noise. It could have been anything, a feral wolf, a rabid wolverine, maybe a wounded lunatic fox, , I spotted a single shed black feather behind another tree close by our's, and went off to investigate.

I leaned on the tree, careful not to make any sudden movements. Cautiously, I looked over to the side, and I saw something that made my heart drop.

It was a particularly young crow, maybe as old as Matt or Gylfie. It was holding its wing that was caked in dried blood, and in between the ill coughs and panting, I heard the poor thing cry. Cry out for reassurance, cry for someone to help. I couldn't ignore someone that was in trouble. Especially not a child, no matter what or who they were. Apprehensively, I limped over to the crow, careful not to make any sudden movements, lest he gets too scared and flees.

"Uh… Hey?" He snaps his neck almost completely one eighty degrees, his orange eyes widened in shock and horror, as he started to back away from me. His breathing became even more erratic while I mentally punched myself in the face for being such an idiot.

" **Real smooth Alex, real smooth."** Daniel apparated next to me, giving me a look of disapproval, as well as a thumbs down.

 _Sometimes, that kid could be a real asshole. I guess I shouldn't have to wonder where he got that from._

I wasn't about to give up so soon, so I took tiny steps to the crow, stopping every so often if I felt like his body would give out. I needed him to trust me, and I didn't have much time left before Matthias would catch wind of my absence.

"Listen, I'm not going to hurt you, I just wanna help, that's all." I spoke slowly and clearly so that he could understand me. He backed up into a tree, and I made no more movements.

"Please don't hurt me! I know this is your territory and I'm intruding, I'll leave as soon as I can!" He was absolutely terrified of me, and I had no idea why. My eyes locked on to Daniel, as I hoped that maybe he could assist me.

" **Alright, let me think for a second… why don't you tell him a funny joke?"** Daniel's suggestion seemed a bit outlandish, but I didn't really have any more ideas for calming the crow, so I took him up for that offer.

 _What's a good joke that won't come off as too cringy or creepy for another bird? Definitely can't use any human ones, and I don't know any ones for crows._

Suddenly, an imaginative light bulb appeared over my head, and I knew what to say. It was kinda stupid, but it might just work.

"Knock, knock." He gave me a "What the hell are you talking about?" look. His confusion was rational, but he did seem to know what to say next.

"Um… who's there?"

"Who?"

"Who, who?"

"I didn't know you were an owl too!" I mock gasped, covering my beak with my wings. The joke initially went right over his head, but then I saw him realize what it was. His face grew a small smile, and he almost kept his composure before he belted out a soft chuckle. However, his previous anxieties towards me emerged once more.

"Are you gonna… eat me now or what?" That was certainly alarming, is the consumption of sentient beings really so commonplace in this world? First Twilight with Mrs. P, and now with this kid?

"Why would I ever do that?"

"Because, my Da said that we taste good, so we have to attack first if we see an owl."

 _I bet you don't taste as good as fried chicken though, god I miss fried food…_

I shook my head, dismissing my thoughts about the wonders of a cooked ready to eat meal.

"Okay, so have you ever _seen_ an owl eating a crow before?"

"No, not really, but I do know that it's true! I'm the perfect treat, defenseless, young, and lean. Why are you still talking to your food?" Okay, it was time for this to end, because this was a conversation that I never thought I would have with someone before, and one I didn't want to have.

"Oh my Glaux, owls don't eat crows! Your father just wanted to hide the fact that he was stealing from them!" I was suitably pissed that his own dad would lie to his son for his misdeeds, My feathers puffed up in utter frustration.

"Wuh- what?" His voice wavered and he started to shrink into the tree, shaking in his non-existent boots. He shields his face with his good wing.

" **Hey, hothead! You're scaring the little guy! Simmer down, will you?"** Daniel intervened, and I also shrunk in shame.

 _Jeez, I keep forgetting about the whole "making yourself look bigger with your feathers" thing that birds do in agitation or self defense._

"Look, I'm sorry for yelling at you, but I'm not gonna eat you, or try to kill you, nothing. All I want is to help you." He raised his wing partially.

"Ruh-Really?" Uncertainty rang through his question, but I begun to amble to him, and started to reach out to him. He shivered madly, the erratic breathing returned. Finally, I wrapped a wing around him, and merely embraced him for a time. After awhile, his quaking slowly started to decline, his breaths for air becoming mollified.

"See? I'm not eating you."

"I guess not, I just hope you're telling the truth, because I don't wanna be a snack."

"Ugh," I groaned. "I can't force you to believe me but right now, we should get that wing fixed up." Just as I said that, he almost tripped on the ground in pain. I caught him, and I gave him a shoulder to lean on.

"I… I don't feel so good." He murmured, already feeling down and out from exhaustion and blood loss.

"Come on, let's get you out of the open, yeah? Don't want any wolves or bats trying to take a bite out of you." I walked over to our rest stop, and I noticed a place that I could set him down. It was a large hole carved out of the tree, most likely for a mammal to sleep in, but for what kind, I didn't know.

"If you don't get me first…" Just then, I heard the wings of a certain screech owl above me.

 _Crap, he's probably super pissed I left him without saying anything._

"Alex! There you are, I've been worried sick about you!" He smacked me on the head with his wing. He then notices the conked out crow on my shoulder.

"So, what's with the crow?" He questioned.

"I don't know who he is, where he came from or anything, but that doesn't matter. You wouldn't happen to have another bandage on you, right?" He looked down at the ground, shuffling his feet.

"No, I don't. We kinda used the only one for you." He awkwardly rubbed his neck with a wing.

"Well, I'm going to leave him in that hole right there, and I want you to keep a close eye on him. If he starts bleeding again, put some pressure on his wound. Got it?" He nodded. I lied the crow down on the tree's inner wall.

"Beware, evil doers, for I am Lyze of Kiel, and I shall never let you lay a talon on this poor young soul." Matthias posed dramatically to basically nobody except me. I wanted to facepalm, but doing that in the air would get me acquainted with the bark of a tree.

I glided from branch to branch in search of any materials I could use to create a bandage. Although maybe I could find somebody's hollow and ask them if they had any lying around. If they weren't there, I'd have to steal it. I'd hate myself for doing it, and the irony would not be lost on me if I did so right after admonishing the crow's father, but I'm sure the life of a child is worth more than a bundle of cloth.

Thankfully, after the fifth tree, I found a hollow that contained what I was looking for. I grabbed what I needed and got out as soon as possible. Sticking around in another's home tends to breed distrust and provokes the owners into attacking the trespasser. At least, out in the country it does.

I retraced my steps back to our temporary shelter, Matthias keenly looking out for any suspicious activity. He heard me land on the ground, and walked up to me.

"You know, you've never told me who your parents are."

"Listen, can we talk about this after I get the crow wrapped up?" I didn't want to come off as rude, but there's something more important than my origin story.

"Alright fine, he's still in there, I made sure of that." He stood tall with pride, well, as tall as he could with his tiny body. I'm starting to believe that genetics just hated his guts.

"Thank you, my heroic knight in no armor. I'll be sure to compensate you for your heroic deeds." I sarcastically remarked to him.

I head to the wounded bird, taking shallow breaths as he slept peacefully on the ground. It sucks that I had nothing to clean his wounds, even hot water would be better than nothing at all, but I had to make due with what I had. Just before I started to apply the bandage to his wing, Matthias stopped me.

"Wait a minute, wait a minute! You need leeches to stop the bleeding before you put that on him."

"Leeches?" What was this boy talking about now?

"Yeah, leeches! They suck up all the blood, and then you can wrap the bandage around his wing." He said, acting like that was the most sensible course of action for me to do before treating his wounds.

"That makes no sense at all. Wouldn't the leeches suck up the blood pouring out as well as the blood still inside you?"

"No," He shook his head. "How'd you think we got you to stop bleeding?" Oh hell no, no freaking way. They did not put those gross worms on my leg, did they?!

" **Pretty sure they did."** Daniel gave his two cents from outside the hole.

"Are you trying to make me yarp, or are you really serious about this?"

"I'm completely serious, just trust me, it works. All you gotta do is find a fresh body of water, and dig around the shore for some of them to stick to your feet."

Has nobody died of sepsis in this world?!


	7. Chapter 7:Foreign Aid

**Early Christmas presents for the peeps who are still invested in this story, I'm sorry for the long wait, yet again. I'll be uploading three more chapters for today, see ya whenever, I guess.**

 **P.S. Happy Holidays, and hope everyone has a happy new year.**

Chapter 7: Foreign Aid

 _I can't believe I agreed to do this…_

Owls aren't meant to wade around in murky water, yet that was exactly what I was doing. I shouldn't complain too much when the life of another in on the line, but still, this was a stupid decision. I'd be better off back at the tree while Matt jumps up and down in this dumb dirty pond. I must look like an idiot sloshing through the water.

After what seemed like hours toiling in the cesspit of things better left unknown to the public, I decided that I had enough. My feathers were soaked, my mood was soured, and when I left I crushed an ugly flower. I took a gander below me, and there was about eight or nine leeches enjoying a delicious snack of sweet blood on my lower limbs. I shudder in revulsion before taking to the air again.

I arrived at the tree, eager to be rid of these horrendous critters. Matthias stood watch from inside, the crow still sound asleep.

"Here, I got your frinking leeches from Hagsmire, just take them." I harshly commanded.

"Great, I'll get started right away." He ripped them off my legs. "You'll have a few bumps here and there but nothing too serious, I hope. How long were you in the water for?"

"Too long." I mumbled under my breath. He went over to the injured bird, and carefully placed the wriggly disgusting blood suckers on his wounds.

"I still don't get how this works." I crossed my wings, grateful that both the crow was supposedly going to be healed, and that they were no longer helping themselves to a crucial liquid in my body.

"You don't have to understand how, but if you want to know, I'm sure the Guardians have someone who's got all the details." He said, smiling at his finished work.

"When do we take them off?"

"Well, right now he started bleeding again, so when the leeches are satisfied with their meal, we can apply the bandage." We walked out of the tree to give the crow some privacy, and then I could hear Matt's stomach growling in hunger.

"Um, you don't mind volunteering for a little hunting game, do you?" He hesitantly asked, a sparkle lighting up in his eyes. Everyone apparently knew the art of begging while putting on a cute face, even in another world/dimension.

"I don't, but don't be surprised if I don't come back with anything. I'm not really good at acquiring food."

"You'll be fine, a mouse or vole should be good for me and you. If he wakes up, then I could get another one for him." He patted me on the back reassuringly.

"Thanks for the vote of confidence." I deadpanned.

"You're welcome!" He gleefully replied, either ignoring the poignant sarcasm or blissfully unaware of it.

I flew up to another tree close by, scanning the environment for any potential prey to rip my talons into. I've never done this before, since food was irregularly handed out by the guards in St. Aggies, but this would be a good learning experience. How hard could it be?

" **Depends on how much you suck at hunting."** Daniel suddenly appeared to the right of me, scaring me for a split second.

"Jesus, would you stop doing that?!" I exasperatedly questioned the blue eyed bird, who shook his head.

" **It's hilarious seeing your reaction."** He smirked slyly at me.

"I hate you." I muttered, although like Soren, he picked up on what I said.

" **Oh, you know that's not true, you love me, don't you?"** He cooed, and I rolled my eyes in disapproval.

I turned my attention away from the owl, and tried to focus on the sounds of the forest below me. I don't know if it's a rumor or not, but some people have said that barn owls can hear the heartbeat of a mice from a mile away.

 _I think my ears must be clogged with wax or something, because everything seemed a bit muted._

" **You don't hear anything?"** Daniel asked, and I shrugged in disappointment.

"Nothing at all, all I am getting is those stupid chirping and rustling of leaves, and I don't know where they're coming from."

" **Well for starters, why don't you estimate where the rustling sounds are coming from?"** He suggested, and I tried focusing my hearing once more. However, I still came up with nothing. Daniel did give me a weird pointer, in an attempt to help me.

" **Trust your gizzard, not your brain. Don't listen only to the ground below us, listen to it. Can't you feel it from within, telling you what to do, where to go?"**

"You know I don't believe in that crap, right?" I caustically commented.

" **Yeah, it was worth a shot. I forgot that you don't really have one."** He sighed in defeat. I was about to give up, but then I heard a very faint, but distinct sound in the distance. A low, rhythmic thumping, accompanied by leaves crackling.

"Wait! I think I heard something moving! Over there!" I gasped in excitement, pointing down to the ground near the tree we were perched on.

" **What are you waiting for, get to it!"** He egged me on, and we hurriedly glided to another tree. With a great amount of caution in my wing beats, I listened intently below me. I attune myself to the sounds of the forest, and after a few moments of concentration, the same beating came from the ground, closer to me than before.

I peered down at the brown leaves scattered around the forest floor, and then I finally saw it. A defenseless plump mouse, soon to be devoured by me and my compatriot. I jumped off the branch, swooping in to catch my kill, while the rodent desperately tried to halt its demise.

My talons grasped tightly to the small animal, and stabbed themselves in just the right spot to quickly end its life. Daniel landed behind me, cheering for my successful endeavor.

" **Looks like your first hunt went great. Good job, Alex!"**

"I couldn't have done it without my terrible Tyto teacher." I derisively said to the owl, who frowned in mock sadness.

" **Aw, you don't have to be such an asshole about it."**

I flew back to our temporary hollow with a huge grin on my face. Matt was going to be so amazed. I touched down from my flight, and I made sure that the mouse couldn't be seen. I hid it underneath a pile of dead leaves. He came out, wearing an unsure smile.

"So, did you get anything?" I slowly revealed the hiding spot of my catch of the day.

"Will this satisfy the great and powerful Lyze of Kiel?" I teased the small screech owl.

"Are you kidding me? This could feed the both of us, and we'd still have something leftover for our patient!" He eyed the dead rodent in childlike wonder. Honestly, I love seeing Matt smile. His entire being makes all but the coldest of hearts want to join in his fun.

"Let's go inside, we don't want anyone taking away our meal, do we?" He furiously shook his head. He bounced up and down like a toy, almost hitting his head on the tree's bark. With the three of us, the hole was a bit crowded, but it was safer than remaining out in the open for other predators to hunt _us._

We sat down, digging into our meal caught by yours truly. The taste of raw meat wasn't as bad as I first thought it to be, which was good because unlike bugs, I could actually eat it without wanting to vomit. Maybe it's like if you catch your own food, it makes it taste better.

"Thanks Alex, this really hits the spot!" Matt licked the corners of his beak in satisfaction.

"I aim to please." I said, tearing off another chunk of meat off the mouse. My eyes wander to the crow, who was now bandaged and was starting to come to.

"Well, looks like our guest has woken up. We'd like to have you for dinner, if you feel like you're up for it." Matt suggested to the bleary eyed crow.

"Is that supposed to mean that you _will_ eat me, or…?"

"No, we have a really big mouse, and we want to share it with you." I plainly said to him, who quickly agreed to partake in our sorta brunch (I don't know what they call it, tweener?).

"What is he talking about, Alex?" Matt asked me.

"His dad kept telling him that owls eat crows, and it's still sticking." I replied, a bit annoyed that he momentarily forgot that not all owls were out to get him.

"That's your name, Alex? Not what I expected, but it does sound kinda nice." The crow nibbled on another piece of mouse as he talked.

"My name's Matthias, it's a pleasure to meet you." He smiles gently and reaches his right talons over to the crow, who slowly shook it in apprehension.

"I'm Cato. I'm shocked, but also glad that you kept your promise," He looked over to me. "I guess not every owl wants to eat me, but there's still a chance of it happening, I'm sure of it."

"So, Cato, are you willing to tell us what happened to you, or is that subject too sore for you right now?" I ask the corvid.

"Not really. No offense, but I don't know you guys that well."

"I know what we can do!" Interjected Matthias, raising his wing like he was at school, sitting behind a desk.

"What?" Cato and I inquired at the same time.

"We should start out slow, like where we lived and the names of our relatives, and then we can keep going until you feel like you wanna stop."

"Sounds good to me." I shrug, and Cato was seemingly at odds with himself. It's a good way to break the ice, because even I still don't know everything about Matthias, although that's mostly because we were never given the chance to properly talk about our lives before we were captured.

"Why don't you begin, Alex?" Wow, way to put me on the spot just like that. Thankfully, I can be a little honest with them, barring the "former human" secret.

"Okay, I don't actually know who my parents are, or where I was born, but I do know that I was rescued from a burning tree by another, way bigger owl than me. She kinda hoarded a lot of different stuff in her hollow. I don't know what you would call them, but her hollow was an absolute mess. She may have saved me, but I think I'm better off without her. I didn't want to die from mold and pollution in the air."

"Really? My parents did talk about a fire sweeping in the eastern part of Ambala, but you're a Tyto. Unless you were in a different forest fire. Do you know if it was in the Tyto forest?" Matthias questioned.

"There's a forest literally called Tyto forest? Isn't that a bit egotistical or something, naming a piece of land after your species?" I remarked, and Cato was also kind of confused at this weird terminology.

"I never understood it myself, but you must have been hatched in it. I've never heard of an owl being born in a place that wasn't where most of their kind comes from."

"Well, I think that's enough about me, what about you Matthias? Where were you born?" I spun the figurative bottle back to him.

"For me, I was hatched in Ambala. I had a loving mother named Victoria, and my da, Edwin. Me and my brother Nylan would sometimes sneak out to practice our branching. That's actually what got me in Aggies, kinda like Soren and his brother, although I think he wasn't captured." He looked down at the ground, becoming quiet.

"Huh, is that why you were the best flier when we trained with Grimble?" I curiously wondered.

"Probably, I don't know what happened to the poor man, but I hope he and his family made it out alright. I hope my family is alright."

 _He doesn't know he's… no longer with us. I detest lying to my friend, but telling him the truth would surely crush his spirit._

"The dude's a hardy man, you saw him kick Nyra's tailfeathers when we were escaping."

"I know, but I can't help but worry about him. His family doesn't deserve to live with those sick Pure Ones." He spat with hatred at the mere mention of our former captors.

"Wait," Cato interposed. "You guys escaped from St. Aegolius?" He incredulously asked.

"Yeah, there were more of us, but I was injured and they had to leave me and Matt behind. We're going to find the Guardians of Ga'hoole." I answered, and he appeared shocked at the thought of young owls not only escaping the depths of Hell, but also braving the world in search of what very well could be a legend.

"Aren't they just a myth? Do you even know if they're real or not?"

"You don't have to see them to believe in them. There's something in my gizzard that simply tells me that they must be real, isn't it the same for you Alex?" Matthias peered back at me, looking for approval.

"Ehhhh, sorta. We won't know till we get there, I suppose." I mused to mostly myself.

"Cato, are you comfortable enough to tell us where you come from?" Matthias changed the subject, and the crow nodded.

"Yeah, I think I'm good, Me and my family come from Silverveil. My dad was always out, either defending our nest from any attackers, or hunting for food. My mother was the one who taught me how to fly, how to read, things like that. One day, I was separated from my family by a wicked storm and I blacked out, and when I woke up there was nobody around me." He pauses for a moment. "I've been on the move ever since. I… don't know where they are. I… miss them a lot." He started to become teary-eyed, but I slowly wrapped my wing around the crow in a reassuring embrace. He flinched at my touch, before eventually calming down.

"Maybe the Guardians can help you find your parents?" Matthias ebbed closer to the crow, and I released my hold on him.

"Maybe, I don't know." He said unsuredly.

"Why don't you come with us?" Matthias blatantly suggested to Cato, widening his eyes in disbelief.

"You'd really have me? My wing still hurts, but I think I could make it out of here in a couple of days. Are you sure you want me to join you?"

"Yeah!" Matthias shot back at the crow, surprised that the thought of us abandoning another kid in need crossed the avian's mind. "We'd love it if you would come with us, right Alex?"

"Of course, the more the merrier, as they say. Whoever 'they' are." I air quoted.

"Well, it's not like I have anything else to do. So, when do we leave?" He asked, and Matthias smirked at the crow, and I already knew the answer before the words left his mouth.

"Screw waiting, why don't we just go now?!" Matthias sporadically runs out of the tree, leaping off the ground and into the air. Cato looks at him like he was insane.

"Does he always do that, or…?"

"Yep, and I love him for it."

 _I think he forgot that Cato's wing wasn't working right now._


	8. Chapter 8:Devoted and Strong

Six nights later...

The orange sun loomed over the sky, beams of light shined down through the thick leaves of the dozens upon dozens of tail foliage we flew past. A safer option than openly soaring above them, risking the attention of any bandits looking to make some money (or whatever they want from their victims). Matthias was in front, leading our small group, while Cato remained behind.

It's tiring, constantly lifting your arms up and down while also accounting for wind speed, the direction you want to go in, and making sure you have enough space when you get closer to talk to someone so you don't flap your wing in someone's face, but unless you wanted to be well acquainted with the trunk of a tree, you had to do it. At least I don't have to worry about refueling like a jet plane (Food's very different from oil, I can hunt for food, I can't mine for oil). Eventually, we exited the forest, entering an area filled with rolling hills and lush green vegetation. It was a welcome change of scenery, yet I was still worried for our safety.

We couldn't glide right above the grass, multiple predators would spot us and snatch us up and have us for lunch. Matthias, albeit reluctantly, agreed to fly relatively low to the ground. Better safe than sorry, although those were the words of someone who quickly died _after_ they adopted that mentality.

"How much longer?" Cato wearily whined. Me and him were starting to become tired, while Matt, who'd never admit that to anyone, urged us to move onward.

"Those owlets aren't going to wait around forever in Aggies, you know. The quicker we get there, the quicker the Guardians can rescue them!" He shouted to us, and Cato quietly groused while panting.

"Why did I _ever_ agree to this?" He rhetorically questioned to himself.

We went over two more hills, and suddenly, I heard wings beat in the air from behind me, and they weren't Cato's. I peered behind me, and my eyes widened in terror as I saw another, larger black crow tailing us. It made no moves to attack us, strangely, yet I was still out on red alert.

"Um, Cato, check what's behind you." I told him, who gave me a weird look before doing so.

"Oh cool, another crow! Would you happen to know where my parents are?" He asked the other corvid flying beside him, who merely remained silent as the night itself. They shot daggers at me and Matt, and I returned the favor.

"Cato, get away from it now!" I quickly ordered him, and he complied, probably because of my authoritative tone.

"What's going on back there?" Matthias's voice was filled with anxious trepidation. Just then, more and more crows came practically out of nowhere, and in an instant, they were out for blood. My heart pounds in my ears loudly, afraid that one of my friends could perish right in front of my eyes.

 _No, not this time. These fuckers want to die so much, I'll grant their death wishes. No more running away!_

I felt a deep need to save what I loved most in this new world. I could never live with myself if I failed, I couldn't let anyone else die, not on my watch. A bright flame ignited inside my soul, fueling the fight within me. I swiftly maneuver myself over to a crow flying beside me, raking my talons across its body. It tried to slash my eyes, but I dived down to gain speed rapidly, and then I throttled back up and delivered a strong blow to its right wing, crippling the avian.

When I witnessed Matthias being ruthlessly pecked and clawed at, my mind just snapped in righteous fury. No one, _no one_ , hurts _him_ on my watch.

"Get the Hag away from him!" I let out an animalistic screech, my vision turning blood red as I dash over to the two crows. I plant my talons into the skin of the first wicked bird, and I throw it at the other crow, knocking them both out of the air.

I rush to Cato's aid, tackling the bird, momentarily causing it to lose its balance, giving Cato enough time to regroup with Matthias. It soon recovers, and we trade a few blows. It reopened my wound on my leg, although the pain was erased by pure adrenaline. Using my wing, I uppercut the crow, and then I head butted it for good measure.

I look around for any more crows looking to harm me and my friends, but it seems like the rest of the had backed off, either out of respect or fear. They flew off to tend to their wounded, and we settled down on a piece of rock outlooking the sea of Hoolemere. Some sort of natural archway had been formed on it, something Soren definitely knew the name of.

My breath trembles as I try to cool myself down, my body shaking from the ordeal. Thankfully, only I received the brunt of their attacks. My two friends fared much better than I did.

"Are you okay, Alex? You're kind of… bloody everywhere." Matthias worriedly exclaimed.

Now that the rush of the natural painkiller had worn off, I did feel the effects of my injuries. my head felt like it was split open, the bandage on my leg had been ripped to pieces, my leg was burning up, and overall, I felt like complete shit. Nothing entirely new, but still, not good at all.

"If the Guardians are real, I'm sure they can fix you up. Just, stay with us until we get there, Alright?" Said Cato, and I barely nodded yes.

"So, that's the Sea of Hoolemere, right?" I slowly mutter to them, hoping that these Guardians had some Tylenol, double strength, OxyContin, and a shot of Morphine. Maybe some propofol to go with it.

"Yep, it's even bigger than I thought it would be." Matthias looked on in wonder.

"It was foretold that there'd be more trespassers on my shore, much like the others before you three." Said an unknown voice, scaring the bejesus out of poor Matthias.

"Who's there? Show yourself!" I painfully shouted to the mysterious entity.

"It was foretold you'd say that." Out of the shadows came a spindly creature, with spines all over its back. It had blue face paint, and it walked around with a native styled staff, using it like a crutch.

 _I think it's an echidna, but not red with white gloves, oh god no why'd I put that image in my brain._

"Who are you?" Cato curiously asked the enigmatic newcomer.

"It was foretold that you'd ask my name, but I am only called "The Echidna". As it was foretold long ago." Answered the mammalian being, who apparently loved to say the word "foretold".

"Oh come on, I know who he is. He's the echidna who guides us with his spines! Just like my Ma always told me." Matthias proclaimed with a simple smile.

"'T'was foretold the small screech owl would know of the legend." He then pointed to me with his staff, sporting a look of restrained annoyance.

"'T'was also foretold a certain Tyto would aggressively defend his flock from my crows."

"Why the Hag would you send crows that tried to kill us?!" I asked, mortified that he would do such a thing to someone, no less children.

"It was also foretold that the Tyto would ask me such a question, and as such, I will answer. They were a test, to determine whether or not you three have the resolve to carry on, the camaraderie needed to venture beyond this island. Much like the ones that came before you." He turned his back to the sea in front of us.

"We need to get to the Guardians, can you tell us how?" Questioned Cato.

"In order to reach the Tree housing the Guardians of Ga'hoole, use my spines as a guide, and keep between the Whale's Fin and the Eye of Glaux. Never go outside those stars." The echidna slammed his staff, gazing at the three of us. "Now Go!"

Cato and Matthias looked at each other in hesitation, shifting uncomfortably to themselves while I wondered what the hell was an Eye of Glaux, and where the hell was the Whale's Fin in the sky.

The echidna sighs, and I'm guessing Soren and the others must have came before us and acted the same way, judging from the animal's reaction.

"'T'was foretold that the party of three would hesitate, The strands of fate have already intertwined between you all, and with more time, they will only strengthen. Each one, with a role to play." He turns to Matthias. "The healer, with the body of a child, and the most purest of souls."

"Hey!" Matthias was obviously too offended by someone calling him small, and or tiny, to recognize the compliments, although the echidna didn't care. I mean, it's true. He faces to Cato.

"The wanderer, searching far and wide for something he has already found." The crow craned his head quizzically at the echidna, but said nothing. Finally, he turns to me.

"And lastly, the other stalwart defender of his group, who carries a heavy burden on his wings."

 _No kidding, why don't you try protecting your loved ones from vicious crows and red eyed mongrels?_

"You've made it this far, supporting each other. So go, look to the sky... And fly." His wizened smile gave the two the courage to continue, Matt and Cato setting off into the vast reaches of the ocean. My injuries I sustained during the fight were problematic, but I was determined to go with them. Before I left, Daniel popped into my field of view.

" **It's the homestretch now, how's it feel?"**

"I want to go to sleep, in my own hollow, and not worry about anything." I tiredly whisper to him.

"T'was foretold that the Tyto would waste time talking to his scroom friend!" The echidna seemed to be able to see Daniel when nobody else could.

" **Just go, I'll be right here next to you."** The blue eyed bird pushed me, and I got the memo.

I stepped off the island, tiny drops of blood left behind on the rocky edge. I meet up with the two, Matthias doing acrobatic moves in the air in joy, and Cato was smirking at the screech owl's theatrics.

"Remember, when your wings are weak... ...your spirits done... ...and you've flown as far as you can... ...you're halfway there!" Yelled the echidna as we embarked on our journey once again.

"What did he say?" Cato wondered out loud.

"Who gives a rat's ass, let's go!" I flew in front of the two, the prospect of getting a good night's rest and the assurance of the children's rescue from Aggies was all I needed to keep going. Unfortunately, our enthusiasm soon turned into panic.

We flew and flew for what felt like a millennia. The calm ocean we saw before we set sail was slowly replaced by the roars of vicious, and powerful waves from below. A chilling shower washed over us, and even with a third eyelid, we were nearly blinded from the heavy droplets of cold water. A storm was brewing, and we were caught right in the middle of it.

My wings grew heavy, like they were shackled with twenty pound lead weights. My head was absolutely pounding, I wanted to puke out my innards but nothing would come out, the pain was so horrible. Yet I had to keep going, no matter what. I'm not going to sink down into the depths of the ocean, I'm not going to leave all my friends behind.

 _I've already done that once. I don't plan on doing it again._

"I think we're in the mist! The tree must be on the other side, I know it!" Matthias's voice came out muffled, it was like when I was back on the hospital bed, dying in front of everybody. Like being born again to my new parents, and almost dying in a blaze of agony. This time, I'll make it out, I have to. Not just for me, but for Matthias, for Cato, for Soren, for every kind man, woman and child I've ever known in this world.

"I've been in one storm, and I survived. I'll survive this one too! My family's out there, and I'm not dying today!" Exclaimed Cato, determined to get through this disaster. It must have taken all of his integrity to not freak out and go yeep into the water.

"Alex… what's wrong with your wing?!" Matthias cried out, and I looked over to my right, and a thin sheet of ice had formed. My heart dropped, just like I did in an uncontrollable descent down to the waters below. I flap my other wing to keep myself aloft, a desperate, and useless attempt at escaping death himself.

 _Is this really how it's going to end? All of the pain and suffering, the laughter and joy I shared with my friends, cut short by the wrath of nature in its most primal form?_

The sound of rushing wind would be the last I would hear before I hit the surface of the ocean. That's what I thought what would happen, but what happened next was the last thing I saw before I closed my eyes, letting Morpheus take me away from the world. And it was so spectacular.

A majestic white owl, wearing an ornate golden helmet, the same kind I once saw a long time ago. Back to where my journey began, it had saved me. Just like she did a long time ago.


	9. Chapter 9:Respite

**Hey, everybody who's still interested in this story, it's been quite awhile since I last posted a new chapter, right? Don't worry, I'm putting one more up right after this one. Hope you like them, and if not, leave your thoughts in a review.**

 **That is, if somebody** ** _wants_** **to do that.**

Chapter 9: Respite

(Matthias POV)

I keep running over what just happened in my head again and again, but I still can't believe it. A real life Guardian swooped in after Alex, catching him in their talons like it was nothing! I wanted to shriek in ecstasy, but for the sake of making a good first impression, I wisely chose not to. It was immensely difficult not to do so, and even harder when the owl of legends spoke to _me_ , in a soft, caring voice. I could hear it, even through the thunderous roars of the crashing waves and the strong winds whooshing in my ears.

"Seems like there's more and more souls coming in every time I set out. Are you two able to fly with me?" The owl asked sweetly, and I gushed in excitement. I nodded vigorously, and she lead the way to the Tree, Cato closely following me. I could see Alex sound asleep in her talons.

We passed by a lonely tree that leaned over the now calm and serene water, numerous owls staunchly perched on its branches, and a large circular thing (I think they're called gongs, maybe) on top. And then we flew inside another, way more extravagant and detailed archway than the one with the meanie head echidna. It sorta looked like the ribs of a grand animal of old, with two small braziers lit on fire. I felt the eyes of the watchman bore into my head, yet I ignored them.

 _I'm only a month and a half years old, give me a break!_

And there it was… the moment I'd been waiting for. The evening sun's rays of light shone through the clouds, adding to the spectacle we beheld. The tree of Ga'hoole, majestic and divine in all of its glory. It's everything I wanted it to be, and even better than that. Cato and I synchronized our gasps of awe, the snow white owl looking back and smiling in amusement. I don't even know where to start, it's so… Ahhhh!

We land on one of the many platforms created by the Guardians, although I think there was also a bit of divine intervention at work here. Thank you so much Glaux, if you did help them. My eyes widen as I do a full three sixty around, dozens of other owls are constantly on the move here, some walking on a bridge nearby, flying up higher to more of the humongous branches above us, there's even a cool waterfall up here! What else do they have?!

"Now, I'll take your friend up in the infirmary as soon as possible. Don't you worry about him, he's in good wings. I'll have one of us help you settle in, you must be quite exhausted after all that, correct?" The white owl informed, taking me out of my reverie and into the real world.

"Uh Huh." I say, the words I actually tried to form in my beak wouldn't come out. She smirks, and takes Alex to this infirmary, leaving me and Cato all by our lonesome. He looked a little too worried about something.

"What's wrong, Cato? We're finally here, isn't it the best?!" I ask the crow.

"I'm just nervous, I haven't seen so many owls in one place until now. And I don't think _they've_ seen a crow in this place until now."

"Try to focus more on the positives. We're perfectly safe here, we can check how Alex is doing, and I'm sure that Soren and the others are here, we can meet them the first chance we get." I put on my signature pouty face, which never failed. "Don't you wanna see what this awesome tree has to offer?" He groaned in defeat.

"Guess I know how Alex must feel whenever you do that to him. Fine, I'll try not to get my feathers all up in a bunch. I will say this, if these Guardians try to eat me, it's going to take a lot more than that to keep me here."

"They're suppose to vanquish evil, not make delectable treats out of crows." The idea's ridiculous, but topical for the corvid. We'll have to work really hard to get that out of his head now that we're here. Just then, out of the corner of my eye, approached a gray barred owl. He had a single faded facial scar running over his right eye, and a furrowed brow.

"So, you're the two newcomers the queen wanted me to guide. A pipsqueak, and a shifty crow." He mockingly said in a snide tone.

 _Glaux, I hate it when people call me short._

"I don't know who you are, but I can put up a good fight, jerk-bird!" I put my wings up in an attack stance, my feathers puffing up. Dissasspointly, he chuckled out loud at my display of power.

"Looks like the little ball of fluff has some fire in his gizzard. Kid, have you ever been in a real fight before?"

"Well, not really, but I promise I can kick your tail feathers!" I stuttered to the rude owl, who pretended I wasn't there and turned to Cato.

"As for you, I hope you're not planning to raid the tree. We outnumber your kind three hundred to ten, at least. " He folded his wings, and sneered at him.

"No sir, I just wanna see how my friend is doing. Can you show us where they might be?" Cato hesitantly asked, apprehensive of the owl's reaction.

"In due time. For now, follow my lead, and don't even think of wandering off. Unless you want to be permanently evicted and treated as an enemy of the Guardians." He ordered.

 _This dude's not really setting a good example for other kids, I hope not every Guardian is like him._

Cato tailed really close behind me, and we were escorted by our lovely warden, flying halfway up the tree and entering a vast network of pathways. I don't know how, but it felt like it was cramped and cozy at the same time. We brushed by multiple older and younger owls, ones that were far better at navigating the tree than we were. He lead us to a large room, dotted with nests as far as the eye could see.

"This will be your temporary sleeping quarters until you are assigned your personal hollows, that is, if the parliament wants to accept more owlets like you." Is he talking about Soren and the others? They're definitely better than him, personality wise. I've met really bad meanieheads, but I think he takes first place.

We head back outside, flying down to the other end of the bridge. There seemed to be another room behind him, but before we could make any further moves, he stopped us with a wing.

"This is the parliament, here at the Tree of Ga'hoole, we have a form of government that no other kingdom possesses. This is where your fate will be determined. Like I've said, I doubt they'd want more useless scrappers, but regrettably, I'm not in charge of decisions like those." He angrily muttered something under his breath, probably about how they're idiots for not giving him that position.

 _I'm glad that someone around here knows how much of a meanie head he is._

He brought us back up the tree, in yet another winding claustrophobic road. I've never really thought about it before now, but this place is gigantic. It actually seems to be bigger inside, rather than out. Maybe it's just me, but I like being out in the open. I'm a natural born flier, it's a big reason why I hated St. Aggies, but not the only reason, obviously. We followed him up another vine hanging off the wall, and we were soon inside another wide area, filled with owls in varying degrees of pain.

"You've got five minutes, nothing more, nothing less." He stepped out of the infirmary, leaving us to our devices.

A few owls were there out of exhaustion, with no discernible physical injuries, then there were the ones with cuts and scrapes, so on and so forth. The few who were heavily wounded were currently fast asleep, comatose.

Unfortunately, that's what Alex was whenever I rushed up to him. He was lying in a bed, his leg was rebandaged and there was a new one wrapped around his head. They were both stained with his blood. He kept taking in these shallow breaths for air that sounded so...wrong. A fresh linear claw mark ran down the side of his face. Cato walked up, shakily reaching a wing out to my best friend. I gently hold Alex's wing, and I smile lovingly at the silver owl.

"I don't know if you can hear me right now, but we made it Alex. I just wish that you could wake up faster and see how awesome and magical this place is. I... I don't like seeing you like this, Cato doesn't either. I…" I begin to tear up, bad thoughts started to swirl around in my head. " I don't want to lose you, not after everything we've been through. You're stronger than that, I know you are." Two teardrops land on the ground, and Cato wraps his wings around me, and a tender warmth spreads across my body.

We remained like that for awhile, no words spoken and the world went silent. I eventually peered around the crow's body, and I caught a glimpse of another large owl with a slight limp in its left leg, walk over to us. Unlike our escort, it beamed compassionately at our plight.

"It's always nice to see the youth of this tree care for one another. Are you friends with this young owl?" Cato released his embrace, and I wipe my eyes with my wing. The owl, now that she was up close to me, had two small ear tufts that resembled the ears of a creature from the north, and tired yellow eyes.

"Yeah, we wanted to see how he was doing." I answered, still on the verge of crying again. "Will he be okay?"

"I've tried everything I could do for the boy, but I won't lie to you two, he's in pretty bad shape. Moderate bruising on the forehead, multiple gashes across his entire body, some running deep and nearly exposing bone…" In the midst of her medical explanation, Alex was suddenly sent into an awful continuous coughing fit, hacking up alarming amounts of blood.

"Oh my Glaux!" The owl uttered in dismay, desperately looking around the room for something. "Where's that lazy wet-pooper when I need him?!"

Cato froze in terror, locked in place by the horrifying sight of Alex's suffering. For me, I hurriedly stormed up to the owl, ready to help her however I could.

"What can I do?" I asked her, and the mask of a professional had been put back on her.

"I'll sedate him, and you grab some red mint from the table over there." She points to a rectangular surface across the room, and grabs a small vial filled with a viscous purple liquid. I rush over to the table, hopping over the vacant beds. I take the medicinal herb, careful not to crush the fragile leaves in my talons. When I come over to Alex, he was still coughing, but not as forcefully as it was moments ago.

"Hurry, the tincture doesn't last for long, crush the herb in your talons and press them down hard on his chest." She commanded, and I swiftly followed her instructions, grinding the herb and placing it on him. From Alex's reaction, although he was still asleep, it looked like it hurt. Even I felt the strong heat come off of it, like it was burning in my own talons.

Cato was shaken out of his scared stupor, coming over to us, and I hold down the herb, waiting until the owl gives me the go ahead to remove it.

"Alright, That should be enough. Red Mint works best in the first minute of continuous contact with the body. Otherwise, the patient's body will start to become irritated." I take the warm herb off Alex, the owl and myself breath a huge sigh of relief. Just when I thought my troubles were over, our chaperone angrily stormed in, barely obscured rage present in his tone.

"What part of "five minutes, no more no less." Did you two imbeciles not get?!" He huffed in searing irritation, stomping over to us, but she actually had the nerve to physically retaliate against his harsh attitude. She cut him off with her wing, pushing him away.

"Samzon, I've tolerated your nonsense for the _last_ time. These are children, for Glaux's sake! They've just seen their friend almost die on them! Do you want me to make another report on your behavior, maybe you'll do flint mops for another three months, is that what you want?!" Her razor sharp words cut through his defenses, temporarily revealing the dread and fright within. Just as quickly as it was discovered, the wall of cynicism was rebuilt.

"Alright, fine! Let's have the owlets from who knows where freely wander around the tree, spilling all our secrets to our enemies! If they end up killing the one owl with at least a smidgen of common sense in here, or perhaps they'll assassinate the king and queen, whatever the case, it's on your head!" He growls in outrage, knocking over a strange object, breaking it into a bunch of pieces, earning a gasp of shock from the owl. He almost scratches the wood of the tree when he exits.

Once he left, she picked up a shard, wincing from the jagged surface. She recovered a bundle of light blue roses, putting them in a small basin filled with water. She sits down on a stump, rubbing her temples. I hesitantly join her, my rear on the edge. Maybe I can help cool her down.

"Um, miss, I'm sorry for ruining your, whatever that thing is. I should have known that our time was up before he came in." She brought her head back up, her face softens in kindness.

"Darling, it wasn't your fault. Don't apologize for something you weren't responsible for, it tends to make everyone around you unwilling to accept your real apologies. I'd love to take you boys around the tree, but I can't leave your friend alone for right now. I'm sure if you can brave the dangers of the world, you don't need a guiding wing." I decide to hug her, an act that she was surprised at for a moment, before returning the favor.

"Thank you, miss…?"

 _Oh phooey, I don't know her name!_

"It's Mirah, In case you were wondering." She says with a minute grin.

"Nice to meet you, Mirah, my name's Matthias." Cato steps over to us, twiddling his wing tips.

"I, I'm Cato, it's also nice to meet you. Before we go, can you tell us where we can eat something? All that flying's got me starving for some caterpillars." His stomach rumbles just as he said that, and he quietly laughed in embarrassment.

"You know the platform you must have landed on when you came in? If you've seen the bridge that connects it to the parliament, just go in the opposite direction, and you'll find the dining hollow." She tells us, and Cato impatiently jogs outside the infirmary, and before I left, I looked back at Alex.

 _I'll be waiting for you, each and every night, I'll stay right here. This time, I'll be your guardian._

 _I love you._


	10. Chapter 10:Odd one Out

Chapter 10: Odd one Out

Cato mustered all the energy he could spare towards one singular goal, one that was so vitally important, that it had overridden the part of the mind that controlled common courtesy for others. At any moment, he could have collapsed from exhaustion, yet he continued onward. I think I could have too, the non-stop flight over both land and sea had greatly seeped the energy from my body. Still, I wouldn't leave him alone in a place as grand and tall as this.

I quickly caught up to him, matching my pace with his as we searched for any kind of food in the depths of the Ga'hoole tree. At this point, I'd eat pretty much anything I could get my talons on.

After some time spent roaming around the many bridges and spiraling branches of the tree, we had finally managed to locate where the food was being served. It turns out that we didn't need to go down, we actually needed to go up. You can imagine our reaction of this discovery. The sun in the sky had officially disappeared, and the lovely moon had taken its place.

We climbed up some roots, and I was pleasantly surprised to see Gylfie and Digger having tweener with each other, along with a few other owls on the upper levels of the hollow. She noticed my presence, and waved at me and Cato to come join them. The crow eagerly strolled over to them, not saying a word as he grabbed the first thing that he saw (which was a bunch of what seemed to be dried green caterpillars) and shoved a few straight into his beak. I wish I could capture the look on Digger's face, seeing as how Cato literally stole his food right in front of him.

"What the?! Help, someone! I'm being robbed by a crow in the frinking moonlight!" The burrowing owl yelled out, although I could tell that almost nobody took his cry for help seriously. Gylfie giggles at his silly, but understandable display, before turning her attention to me.

"So, looks like you finally made it. I… we, were worried about you two." She said with a heartwarming smile. However, it dissipated when she tried to look over my shoulder. "Where is Alex?" She asked, and while my spirits started to hang low to the ground, I had to be strong about this. No more tears, at least not for tonight.

"He's in the infirmary, recovering from our long journey. He'll pull through, like he always does." I firmly informed her, and while a part of me felt bad for not being entirely truthful about both my feelings on the manner and just how bad of a condition he was in, I didn't want her to worry about him. That's my job, for now. She nodded, and she thankfully didn't press for more details.

"Matty boy, could you please tell me who the hag this is? Because I want to know who I'm fighting before I deliver some much needed justice to this fiend." Digger crudely leered at Cato, over exaggeratedly cracking his neck, which made Cato's eyes widen, and opened his beak in confusion, letting out a half eaten caterpillar.

"Oh, him, that's Cato. He had nowhere to go, so we asked if he would come along with us, and he said yes." I calmly gave him a brief report of our new friend's situation, and I then staunchly stood between the burrowing owl and the crow. "He's not your enemy, and he's not a mugger Digger, he didn't mean to take your food. Right, Cato?" I looked over to him for an answer.

"Um, yes sir, I sincerely apologize for taking your food, and I hope you will forgive me." He said earnestly, but Digger wouldn't stop glaring at him. I honestly didn't know what to do, and I don't think Gylfie did either. The burrowing owl slowly stalks around me and to the crow, making himself look twice as big with his feathers. Cato thrusts his good wing over his face, and started to shake in fear. We back up, unsure of his next move.

Suddenly, Digger started to chuckle amusedly to himself, which started out quietly, but quickly grew into maniacal laughter. Then he started to roll on the wooden floor, cackling like a deranged lunatic. Two, much older owls than I, began to cautiously approach the bumbling burrowing owl.

"Is everything alright here?" One of them questioned the three of us, and we could not begin to explain what was happening. Digger began to speak.

"Oh my- Glaux! You… totally fell for it! Your faces, oh my Glaux, your faces!" He exclaimed through gasps of air. Oh… wow… he really did that, didn't he? I don't think he understood how big of an… _asshole_ he looked at that moment. Gylfie, who quickly took control of the situation, excused the burrowing owl's behavior.

"Sorry sirs, my friend here, as you probably already know, is a _very_ special person." She pats Digger on the head, like he was a baby owlet (I mean, he was already acting like one so…). "Isn't that right, Diggy boy?" She mockingly cooed at him. His laughter had ended, and was replaced by confusion and uncertainty.

"Uh, what the hag are you talking about?" He asked, although the elf owl has sidestepped around his question as quick as a flash.

"You see right there? He has a very bad case of short term memory loss, and it makes him act in what many would consider to be, a stupid, and idiotic way. Once again, I am sorry for the inconvenience good sirs." She politely bowed to the older owls, one of them nodding in approval before leaving the hollow, the other letting out a fair warning.

"I'd make sure that it doesn't happen again, got it?" The owl said, and then left the hollow, a slight limp in his step.

Digger stared at Gylfie incredulously, the slow burn realization that he had just been played for a fool at his own game was a splendor to see. She smugly smirks at the burrowing owl, and it was at that point that I couldn't hold back my own giddy laughter anymore.

"That… was so cool Gylfie!" I congratulated the elf owl, coming over to her and giving her what Alex called, a "high five" with my wing. I personally don't know why it's called that, since wings don't have just five of anything, but hey, I had to do something. She reciprocated the action, and even Cato, who was previously shivering from Digger's antics, churred humorously.

"You might be laughing now, but I wouldn't dawdle for too long. You know they'll ream you out to dry if they find out you're late for practice." Digger mockingly used Gylfie's tone of voice, the astonishment and surprise was wiped away from his face, showing off a grin that rivaled that of a hagsfiend's. However, she remained cool as her homeland at night.

"Yeah, and that includes you too, Digger." She said, before focusing her attention back to us. "I know that you guys have just got here, but I don't think they'll mind having a couple more students around. That is, if you want to be Guardians."

"Wait a second, you're training to become Guardians?" Cato questioned the elf owl, who was as shocked as I was to find out such a discovery. I would have never guessed that someone as… exuberant and abrasive as Digger would ever think to join something that was bigger than himself.

"Yeah, although it's not going to be easy, as it should be. You should have seen Digger after our first night here, he looked like complete, um…" She trailed off, I guess she didn't want to swear in front of us. Digger finished her thought for her.

"I felt like ten pounds of racdrops in a five pound sack, alright? To be fair, they didn't say that we had to learn how to read and write Hoolian, along with all of the other crap we have to do." Gylfie harshly bopped him upside the head for the rude language, although I think it was because she didn't want Cato to hear it, rather than me.

 _Glaux knows how much Alex swears every night._

"Now, we're not forcing you to do anything that you don't want to do, you don't _have_ to come with us. The Guardians are alright with owls that don't wish to join their cause, as long as you're not a threat or anything to them." Gylfie said, and the burrowing owl chimed in with his usual response.

"But, you do get a pretty wicked pair of battle claws and a cool stylish helmet, don't forget about that." She rolled her eyes in dismissal of his comment.

"It's not just about the weapons and armor, Digger. Being a guardian, it's like you have to…"

"Commit to it, right?" I interjected. "You have to swear to yourself, along with everyone you know, that you will defend those that can't defend themselves, mend the broken and weak, make sure that those that are lost will be found. Did you have to do that?" I asked, and Gylfie nodded.

"Yep. It's funny, but I think Soren said something along those lines whenever we were deciding if we really wanted to be Guardians."

"Well, don't tell him I told you this, but at least you didn't completely sound like you were paraphrasing a part of a story that was told by your legend-loving father." Digger lowered his voice, his eyes looking around for the barn owl. I peered around the burrowing owl, and I saw the young Tyto stealthily approach us from behind. He covered his mouth with a wing, I think he was pantomiming a shushing gesture. None of us said a word, and Digger was none the wiser.

"It's not just about the moth, which was clearly mine, but I digress. There's a big lake, somewhere around The Beaks, and the area around it has so many fat and fluffy critters for miles. And it does something to your mind, makes you… crazy."

"Crazier than you?" I wondered out loud. How could a place make someone even worse than him?

"That's not the point I'm trying to make! The frinking place made us all lazy vain assholes, and I'm not entirely convinced that Soren ever changed in the first place."

At that point, Soren strode up real close to him, a mischievous smile growing on his face.

" _You_ didn't." He creepily whispered in his ear. Digger jumps up in sheer terror, effectively head butting Soren right in the lower jaw. The barn owl's plan to scare him had unfortunately backfired. Still, laughing at the expense of my friends wasn't beneath me.

"I knew it! You were trying to kill me, weren't you?" Digger waggled a talon in front of the Tyto, who was rubbing his beak in pain. "Well, you're not going to get rid of me that easily, I'll tell you that!"

Soren sighed, probably getting tired of Digger's attitude. He rolled his shoulders, and then proceeded to pick up the burrowing owl with his wings. Obviously, the newly made passenger didn't take too kindly to being treated as an item.

"What are you doing?! Put me down this instant, you ninny headed mcspazatron! Someone, help, I'm literally being kidnapped! Hel-" Soren squeezed him hard, not enough to harm him, but enough to get him to stop talking and making a scene. I mean, I wouldn't want to be manhandled like that, yet I feel like for this one instance, this course of action was appropriate. The barn owl looks at the three of us, motioning for Gylfie to come to his side.

"I heard a bit about what you guys were talking about before I had that fantastic idea floating around in my head, and I just wanna say that you should probably take it easy for tonight. There's no need to make a decision as big as what we made when you haven't even got enough time to get some rest. You two must be exhausted after all that traveling, right?" He asked, and the two of us nodded slowly. "Go ahead and get some shut eye, and I'll take our little owlet away from here." He smirks, and his passenger's voice, although muffled, could still be heard.

"I hate you all."

"Let's take our lumps together, shall we?"

They leave us at the hollow, with a certain pep in their step. Cato and I were free to continue with our meal, which was something I really needed. I think we had a good excuse for sleeping the night away, and it's not like my schedule wasn't screwed up before. We shared the last of the caterpillars with each other, the taste of them was a tad too salty, but I couldn't complain. We were both drained from everything, yet that didn't stop the crow from speaking his mind.

"You have some very interesting friends, Matt." He tiredly remarked, "Especially that crazy little guy. How'd you guys meet in the first place?"

"We needed a place to lay low, and Digger's hollow was the only one we could find. At first, I thought that maybe we shouldn't have stayed in the home for an insane avian, but now… I'm glad to have met the two of them."

"Two of them? Someone was living with him?" Cato seemed as surprised as I was whenever I discovered that someone was huddling with Digger.

"Yeah, he's a big Great Gray owl named Twilight. Don't worry, he's not quite as, special as Digger. I think they complement each other nicely. That is, if you can believe that."

"So, is he, well, nicer than Digger?"

"He's different, that's for sure. He's kind of like Alex with the unyielding sarcasm, but he prides himself about using his words like the "poet" he is. He has a pretty decent filter."

"I guess Alex doesn't have one, does he?" Cato says and I chuckle in remembrance of all the times that the Tyto used literally every single swear word owl kind had created. Even the one that most people wouldn't use because of its inherent vulgarity, and ones that I wasn't too familiar with.

"Nope, not at all. I don't think he'd tone down the swearing even if he had a bunch of owlets around. But I like him for that."

"Really? Don't you ever get tired of it?"I shook my head no.

"There are way worse things someone could do than flippantly saying frinking or um, uh… fornicating. Are you tired of it? I wouldn't blame you, it took some time for me to adjust to his way of speech."

"Eh, my parents are the same, more or less. You should have heard my father getting angry with some dumb seagulls, he lost his voice for an entire day after that." He peers down to the ground, becoming a bit sullen. "I hope they're still out there, somewhere. I… miss them."

"Hey!" I reach over to the sides of his beak, lifting them up so that he looked like he was smiling. "Turn that frown upside down! If the Guardians can't find them, we will." He slowly grins naturally, his mood lifting from my positivity.

"You always know just how to raise someone's morale, Matthias. Maybe that's why Alex likes you so much."

"That's part of it. Anyways, we should probably get going. I feel like I'm going to pass out at any second."

We leave the dining hollow, and head back to the quarters that the mean owl called Samzon showed us. I noticed that the tree was now bustling with activity, and it was getting harder to maintain Cato's pace. My poor legs were just about to give out, but I was determined to get a good light's sleep (I know that the moon is out, I don't care, I'll sleep through the entire night and day if need be). We carefully maneuver past the waves of owls, of all kinds, shapes and sizes, and we climb our way up to our room.

I don't know if my eyes were playing tricks on me, but I thought that I saw someone very familiar in the crowd. But, it couldn't be, could it? He shouldn't have been up so fast, there's no way he could instantly recover from such an encounter. He should be in the infirmary, safe and sound where nobody could hurt him.

Yet, something in my gizzard was telling me that what I was seeing was actually real. Who was I to ignore such a strong presence in me? When Cato flew up a vine, I chose to follow the silver owl. I slipped away from everyone, and pursued _him._ I wanted, no, I _needed_ to find out the truth.

I tailed the owl outside, using the last bits of my energy to keep up with him. He perched atop one of the many thick branches of the tree, overlooking the lustrous moon in the sky and the expansive sea below. I hung back, partially because I wanted to listen to whatever he would say, and also because I couldn't move anymore. My legs didn't respond to my commands, my eyes growing heavy.

" **I can't believe you… we, made it."** He sounded just like Alex, although there was something mysterious and eerie about his voice. It seemed like there was a slight echo to his words. " **I know you can't hear me right now, but I… I think I'm scared. I don't know what will happen if you die right now. I don't really want to find out either. We've been through too much, it can't end now, can it?"**

Whoever this person was, if it was Alex or someone who looked and sounded the same as him, I could agree with that sentiment. It's too bad I couldn't give him the answers he needed. The barn owl trembles in sorrow, his voice wavering.

" **I don't want you to die. If you died, I… I… would die too. A part of me would die if you left me, left us. Some of them may not admit it, but they all love you.** _ **I**_ **love you. Please… don't leave."** The Tyto wipes his eyes with his wing, temporarily ridding himself of any tears that formed. Suddenly, he turns around, and those eyes, the same eyes as my friend's, looked back at me. " **What, what are you doing here? Did you hear what I said? You can, you can see me too?"** I didn't reply, but I think he knew that I could.

At that point, my body had finally given out. My grip had loosened, and all of my limbs became unresponsive and numb. Wind rushes into my ears, and the voice of my friend screamed my name as I fell closer and closer to the waters below. It was the last thing I would hear before I lost myself to a dreamless sleep.

" **MATTHIAS!"**


	11. Chapter 11:The Ones that Came Before

Chapter 11: The Ones that Came Before

 **Long time, no see, readers. Don't worry, I'm still alive, and I'm still making new chapters for this story.**

 **I'm uploading three more chapters right after this one. I had fun making more of my OC'S, and while the next chapter has some partial, but not overly** **nauseating** **gore, I'll be keeping the rating the same.**

"Are you _really_ sure you want to do this?"

"Absolutely. I need something else to do other than play chaperone for owlets, or snatching blue jays to show off my supposed speed and strength."

"Alright, Fine, but you know what will happen if they find out that we've been sneaking out for… how long again?"

"About three or four weeks, give or take."

"Wonderful."

"Don't be so negative, what's the worse that can happen?"

"Everything and anything."

I think if I rolled my eyes any more, they'd dislodge themselves and end up on someone else's face. It's not like she _has_ to come with me, I mean she could literally tell anybody about what we're doing, and she'd probably get a promotion for a show of loyalty. Either that, or we would both be executed for treason. I guess it depends on who she tells.

We taper off into the darkness of the canyon walls, and we made sure that nobody saw us leave our posts. All of the extra patrols sent out by our superiors didn't make this any easier, but that wouldn't stop me from getting what I needed. And whatever she might say, she needed this too. We all deserve a bit of normalcy from time to time. The two of us were a tad more, proactive in our search of peace and quiet. Besides, we weren't the best soldiers in the army, far from it. I assume they wouldn't miss us too much.

I've lived here for two months, and now, I'm always feeling a strong sense of unending anticipation and anxiety from basically everybody in here. Tensions were high _before_ that whole situation with those owlets. Our queen was absolutely furious when she discovered that not only was a seasoned member of our order secretly training pickers to fly, but that they were sent to inform our sworn enemies of our presence. You can imagine just how royally (Glaux, did I just make a pun?) pissed off she was.

So, with all of this stress running amok at St. Aegolius, and the fact that we were on the brink of war, I desired a chance to forget my troubles. At least, for awhile. It took a little longer than usual, but we eventually evaded the watchful eyes of the soldiers. We flew over the barren landscape of the canyons, the morning sun casting its intense beams of light down at us. Crows wouldn't dare to mob a Pure One in our territory, but with the two of us, we would be easy prey. Skill can get you pretty far, but it will ultimately mean nothing if you didn't have the numbers to back it up. And I will admit this, I'm not a particularly great fighter.

We silently decided to lay low to the ground, enough to make ourselves less noticeable, but not enough to let any mammals or other creatures of the land get any halfway decent ideas. That's probably the most embarrassing thing for an owl to endure. Right next to it was getting sprayed by a skunk. I've heard of some people, who were so distraught over how horrendously awful they smelt, try to drown themselves in a body of water to get rid of the stench.

 _I think a skunk is basically just an over sized brown shield bug with fur. They probably taste like dung and acid dunked in the… natural juices secreted by a male, so to speak._

By the time we had arrived in the outskirts of Ambala, it was almost high noon. The sun's intensity had increased tenfold, irritating my eyes, even with my third eyelid. We quickly soared past the old great trees, and I hoped that our friend would be at home, and preferably awake. Finally, we got to his hollow.

"You better be here, Leon! I'm going to die of hunger pretty soon!" I yelled out in between breaths of air. I could tell my compatriot was starving as well. It didn't stop her from making a sarcastic quip, however.

"If you don't come over here this instant, I'm going to eat Anna!"

"I'll make you guzzle down your own feet before you even try to do that, Liz." I returned fire at the hungry white-faced owl. She blew a raspberry at me, and I proceeded to do the same. I playfully growled at the avian, who was puffing herself up to make herself look bigger. I knock her upside the head with my wing, and she pushes me to the ground. Even in our tired state, we still managed to have a playful mock battle. It mostly contained a bunch of slaps and half-hearted headbutts, but hey, we were incredibly bored, and our lazy friend didn't come out, so…

"Hey gals, could you take your fight outside, please? You know, blood doesn't come out easy on wood." A familiar voice echoes through the hollow, and we both freeze in the midst of our brawl. He slyly grins at the two of us, holding something in his talons. "Unless, you don't want a nice, juicy, succulent, magni- " He was cut off by the wrath of Liz, and was tackled to the ground.

"Give us what you got!" She shouted madly while still on top of the barred owl. I couldn't help but churr at the ridiculous image that I saw. If there's one thing in the world that you shouldn't mess with, it would be a starving Liz.

"Calm down, princess. You won't get what you want with that attitude." He snickered at the hungry owl. She reluctantly released her hold on him, muttering something inaudible to herself. I offered to help him back on his feet, and he was quick to accept it. He opened his clenched talons, revealing a pair of chubby rodents. "So, do you guys want some fresh voles?"

"Do you even have to ask?" I said, almost in disbelief over that rhetorical question of the year.

"I walked right into that one, didn't I?"

"Yep."

"Enough talk, time to chow down!" Liz interrupted, immediately ripping into one of the creatures. I followed suit, and I dug into the other one. It was just like he said, and even more. As I tore another chunk off, I noticed something concerning.

 _Leon shouldn't be that skinny, right?_

I promptly stopped eating, and I looked again at the barred owl. He had his signature smirk smeared across his face, but there was something off about him. His slender body worried me, and you know there's a problem whenever you could start to see ribs poking out, even through his feathers.

"Leon, do you want the rest of mine?" I offered, pushing my food away from me.

"No, I'm fine. I'm not really hungry." He said, although that didn't stop me from trying again.

"No, you're not fine, Leon. You look like you haven't eaten in weeks."

Regrettably, he still refused to take it.

"I'm not hungry! We both know that you get barely anything to eat at your home. I don't want to see you two go without food anymore, alright?"

"And I don't want to see you slowly kill yourself because of us! We'll be okay without a meal or two, won't we, Liz?" I turned to my friend for confirmation, and she thankfully agreed with my sentiment.

"Yeah, Look out for yourself first, Leon. We'll survive without your help, I mean, we've done it before."

"You don't get it, do you? As long as I'm still breathing, I'm not going to just sit here and wait while everything goes to hagsmire in a hand basket." His voice grew cold and distant, "We all know how much the Pure Ones care about you, don't we?"

"They do! It's because of those Glaux-damned owlets that everyone is on edge, Leon! We're preparing for war, they don't have time to feed every single soldier in their ranks." I couldn't believe what I was hearing. How could he even suggest that the only people who ever gave a rat's arse about us, actually didn't?

"Look around you, Anna! For Glaux's sake, have you ever seen what they do to pickers?"

"We save them from being orphans, we give them a place they can call their own, we give them a family again." I answered, although he wasn't satisfied at all with it.

"So, you really don't know what happens to them?"

"We convince them to work for us, to aid in the war effort. If they don't want to be soldiers, they can be someone else. They can help with the eggs in the eggorium, the ones that we saved from all those fires and storms. They can make weapons and armor, what are you trying to get at, Leon?" I was getting really frustrated with his doubts.

"Convince? Have you ever seen any of the owlets, walking around in circles for hours underneath the full moon? Do you know what that does to them?"

"It teaches them discipline, obviously. I know being awake in the daylight can be weird at first for anyone who isn't diurnal like I am, but it's not like they do it for all eternity. In fact, I-"

"You know what?!" Leon suddenly blurted out, startling both me and Liz. "If I can't get through that thick skull of yours with words, than I should just show you!" He harshly pushed me outside his hollow. "Come on, you gotta go back soon, right?" He sardonically stated, but I ignored him.

"You coming, Liz?" I called out for my friend, who dejectedly came out.

"We don't have much of a choice, do we?" She sighed.

"You do. You always do." Leon crudely mumbled, giving me a dirty look before leaping off the branch and into the air.

A part of me didn't want him to come with us, yet I knew that the barred owl wouldn't give up so easily. Surely, whatever he was trying to say, it wasn't true. The Pure Ones are my family, the only one I've ever known. They wouldn't lie to me, not to me, they wouldn't.

We follow his lead, retracing our path to the canyons. The transition from life to death as we flew close to the ground was always sad to see, but I've heard that Aggies is just a military base of operations, it can sustain life, yeah, just not plant life. There's gotta be places where we live that aren't constant reminders of death, right? I must be thinking too much about this, it screws with my head and nothing good comes out of it. I'll prove Leon wrong, and we can all forget about this.

The sun was still out when we arrived at the borders to my home, although it was already beginning to set. Hopefully, nobody will see us flying around. We hang around the unstable walls of the canyons, and suddenly, Leon stops us.

"Alright, now you must have seen other owlets arrive around this spot, correct?" He quietly whispered. Liz and I nod almost imperceptibly. "So, you should take a good long listen at what those two are saying. You do know them, right?" He points to a familiar horned duo.

"Yeah, I know who they are. They're not the brightest pair in the bunch, but I don't think they're evil or anything." Leon raises an eyebrow in intrigue.

"They're not evil? Well, just listen to them for a second, see if that changes your mind."

I try to key into their conversation, and I could more or less hear what they were talking about. My hearing wasn't quite as good as a Tyto, but it was serviceable for the time being.

"Brother, o pal of mine, how are ya?" Jatt casually walks up to Jutt, who comically bumps him on the head, before making a short embrace.

"Good, better than you, no doubt." Quipped the horned owl. To my right, Leon rolls his eyes, and Liz stifles a chuckle. "Have you heard how many of those little tykes I got today?"

"Nada."

"Seven. I think I might have beaten your record." The other horned owl didn't look impressed with that number.

"Nope, my all time best was probably around ten, maybe even more if you count those clutch of eggs from Kuneer."

"Eggs count as cheating, Jatt! There's no challenge if they aren't constantly squirming in your talons."

"Fair point." His eyes widen in realization, frantically looking around. "Racdrops, I think we're late for our new arrivals, come on!" He roughly pushes his brother forward.

"I gotta make sure I got my new face right, Jutt!" Jatt retorted, and they hurriedly left our line of sight.

"So, you see nothing wrong with what they said?" Leon questioned, and I shake my head.

"They make it a game so that they don't have to burdened about how many owlets we have to rescue every day. I don't think there's anything wrong with that, other than the part about the wriggling in their talons. That's a bit, uh…"

"Demented? Psychotic? Dare I say it, Evil?"

"It doesn't mean _anything_. You can't judge a group or government based on the actions of a few members!" I raised my voice in exasperation, and I almost let a passing patrolmen be notified of our presence. We lean against a large boulder, waiting for what felt like an eternity. Liz slowly peeks over the corner, and gives us the all clear.

"Anna, you really need to better control your emotions. I know it's not a prerequisite for being a Pure One, but still." Leon stares me down like I was a little owlet. I mutter a curse that hopefully went unheard. "Now, before we were so rudely interrupted. They're carrying out the orders _your_ group made. I mean, wow, this is really starting to sound like your little family isn't as good as you might think, huh?"

"Is there anything else you want to show me, show us?!" I cautiously keep my voice down, while still maintaining a tone of annoyance and anger.

"There's a few more things I'd like to show you, but there _is_ one vital piece of information that you should know about your _family_." He spat the word with incredible amount of scorn. I wanted to knock him out flat on his ass, yet he was my friend. I wouldn't be a good one if I didn't at least hear his case before doing so.

 _I still wanted to do it, though._

We stealthily made our way past more guards, and landed in a remote location down below. We all knew where we were headed. It's the one place that I wish all of the owlets didn't have to go through when they first arrive here. Using the shadows to our benefit, we crept inside the pelletorium. Being a picker's hard work, I know how bad it can get, but I don't think it's suppose to be a long term occupation. You gradually move up through our system, and you earn more privileges as you go up the chain of command. Liz and I were just common grunts for the military, but given enough time, I'm sure we would eventually become full fledged Pure Ones. Like that young Tyto who decided to stay instead of leave with his traitorous brother. He's been here for over a month, and he's already issued his own helmet and battle claws, I'd be lying if I said I wasn't jealous.

We manage to evade being discovered by the patrolmen, and we maneuvered our way to an unusually open part of Aggies. The sun was barely in the sky anymore, and night was coming quickly. Leon leads us to a small group of owlets digging up what I assumed was pellets. Like, I know why they were searching through them, but it didn't make it any less gross for me. I'm glad I don't have to do that anymore.

"Anna, you do know how these owlets are named, correct?"

"Yeah, we were all given numbers to replace our old names. It's only after some time that you are either allowed to keep your old name, or make a new one for yourself."

"Uh-Huh, and If I'm remembering this right, you didn't have a old name, and you were given your name by your superior, yes?"

"Right. He was the first person who wasn't constantly mad or upset at me, besides you and Liz." I faintly smiled as I vividly recalled the memory.

 _A young owl, no older than two weeks, was currently honing her skills in combat. Her movements were janky and uncoordinated, yet she continued to practice on the single wooden log in front of her. Numerous small claw marks are etched alongside its surface. She keeps kicking and scratching the improvised practice dummy, counting the number of strikes in her mind. She kept going, kept pushing herself to reach her record, and surpass it. Suddenly, after a failed attempt at performing a showy spin kick, she cried out in pain and fell to the dusty cold ground. She looks down at her leg, wincing as she tries to alleviate herself of the injury._

 _She shakily stands back up, and tries to perform a slightly less risky move. She prepares to deliver a quick kick to the center of the dummy. As soon as she makes contact, she almost shrieks in agony. In her haste, she forgot about her injury, using her bad leg to accomplish the task, and she was once again on the ground. Her limb throbs uncomfortably. She holds back the tears that were starting to form in her topaz yellow eyes. She tries to get herself back on her feet, but to no avail. She whimpers to herself, and crawls to a little alcove, free from the scrutiny of her peers._

 _This place was her home away from home. She was free to do whatever she wanted in here. Nobody to yell in her face, nobody to critique her every single move. Nobody to tell her what to do. So… she did what she always does best._

 _She let go of her emotions. The dam had been broken once again, and the tears were falling freely. Some were picked up by her downy black and white feathers, and the rest drop down to the ground, making tiny pitiful puddles. She curls herself up into a ball, and quietly weeps to herself. Being alone was like a double-edged sword, and she knew firsthand of the effects one suffers from it._

 _Fortunately for her, she wouldn't be alone for long. Another soul had passed by her shelter, and they had listened intently to her sorrow. They decided to reveal them self to the girl, and calmly approached her. At first, she did not hear the footsteps getting closer to her, but then she realized that someone else was inside._

 _She ceased her crying, and wiped her eyes. Negative thoughts clouded her mind, although she desperately wanted to appear strong and capable in front of the other owl. She got up from her position, and tried to ignore the pain in her leg. However, she couldn't stop a feeble yelp from escaping her mouth. She peered up at the unknown visitor, and she saw something that she had never seen before._

 _The owl was smiling at her, a gentle and reassuring one. She couldn't begin to comprehend the positive vibes that the avian was putting off. Then, it started to speak to her._

" _What are you doing here, little one?" The owl's powerful masculine voice belayed a much softer, and kinder soul. It poured into her ears like a pitcher of cool water. He looked down at the girl's new injury, and asked her a question that for once, she felt like she could answer. "May I?" He slowly reached out his right talons, and she permitted his actions. She cringes at his poking and prodding, but it wasn't brutish or anything. It was calculated, and smooth._

" _Alright, Come with me, little one. I'll make everything better, I can promise you that." She nods, blinking back a few more tears, her eyes red and puffy. The larger avian carefully lifts her off her feet, cradling her in his wings. "Huh, thought you'd be lighter, lass." He chuckles good naturedly, he clearly underestimated her size. She quietly titters at the comment, a weak and meager voice, yet still filled with the rising joy of a child. He helps her turn around onto his back, and she plants her own wings around his neck, and hangs on for her dear life._

 _He carries her through her home, the luminescent moon hanging over the heads of everyone. Some soldiers and guards give quizzical looks at the two as they go by, yet none of them confronted the older owl about it. It was probably for a good reason. Usually, the cold didn't bother her too much, but this night was bad for anybody who wasn't fledged. She was very thankful for the warmth that seemed to radiate from the older owl's body, and snuggled herself deeper into his thick feathers._

 _After some time, they eventually entered a spacious room, spread with various makeshift nests and two torches illuminating bright light. He sets her down on one of them, and she begins to pout, not wanting to leave him._

" _I'll be right back. Keep that chin up, lass." He puts a wing under her beak, and she faintly grins at the avian. He leaves, going into a nearby corridor. She turns her attention back to her injured leg, and experimentally tried to stand up once again. It was like how she assumed, she wouldn't be standing up for a while without didn't take long for the man to return, and in his talons was a strange plant that she had never seen before, and a small bundle of white cloth._

" _This should help with the pain and keep the swelling down. It'll be cold, but it'll be a heck of a lot better than what you're going through right now." He began to crush the green plant, and pressed it against her leg. It was just like how he said it would be. A small chill ran down the little girl's spine, but the pain was mostly gone. He wrapped the fabric around her leg, tying it tightly so that it would t fall off. He smiled at his work, and he asked the girl how it felt._

" _Was I right?" She nodded, and at that point, she said her first words to him._

" _Thank you, Mr…" Sadly, she didn't know the owl's name. Fortunately, the owl gave her his name._

" _It's just Frazier, sweetie." He answered. "What's your name?"_

" _Um, It's 6-92." She replied, although the owl shook his head for some reason she could not understand._

" _Not your number name, your real name. You have a real name, don't you?"_

" _I'm just 6-92, nobody ever calls me anything else, sir." He gazed down to the ground for a moment, and looked a little surprised that an owlet would have such a name._

" _Lass, how would you feel about having an actual name?" He inquired, and while she wasn't completely on board with the idea, she did not object to it._

" _I guess it would be okay." She said apathetically, shrugging her shoulders._

" _Okay? This isn't a punishment or anything. Someone like you deserves a proper name, numbers won't help you stand out in a crowd. You need something that people can remember, and something that means something to you. What about Jennifer? Would you like that?" She shook her head. "How about… Gwynevere?" She shook her head with fervor, that sounded a bit too fancy and eccentric for her taste. It didn't feel right either. The older owl's eyes light up, and it seemed that he finally realized what name best suited her._

" _How about... Anna? Do you like that, sweetie?" At first, she wanted to say no, but then, her gizzard, which had been deathly quiet ever since her rescuers found her and took her in, had finally spoke up. She would be a fool to disagree with her gizzard._

" _I like it. Anna. It's nice, rolls off the tongue easy too."_

" _Good, I'm glad you like it, Anna." He smiled when he used her new name, and she gave her own to Frazier, which could have melted the hearts of anybody, as well as entire icebergs in the lands up north._

" _Thank you, Mr. Frazier." She hugged the owl, who was for a brief moment, taken aback by the action, before fully embracing the snowy owl._

" _You're welcome." They held each other for a few more seconds. Frazier slowly lets go, and starts to speak again. "Now, I think it's time for you to go to sleep, lass. " She sulks, and tries her best cute face to convince the eagle owl to stay up for a least a little longer. Unfortunately, he would not change his mind._

" _You won't have to sleep outside, Anna. You'll be in here, where it's nice and warm, and I'll be right here watching until you fall asleep." She mutters her displeasure, and begrudgingly begins to settle down in the nest. She closes her eyes, and attempts to get herself into the land of dreams. She kept tossing and turning, trying to get that sweet spot. Yet nothing could get her to where she wanted to go._

 _Luckily, there was someone else that could help her with her little journey. Frazier climbs into the nest, and pulls her into his chest, and she was already starting to feel drowsy and tired._

" _Is this better, Anna?" He quietly whispers to the snowy owl, who murmured her answer._

" _Yeah."_

" _Good night, Anna."_

" _Good night, Mr. Frazier."_

"Hello, Earth to Anna, do you copy?" A voice calls out to me, and I was brought back from the recesses of my mind. Leon seemed miffed at my trip in nostalgia land, but said nothing. He turns around to the group of owlets. "I'm going to do something that you can't ignore, got it?" I nod, my attention fully directed at the barred owl.

"Hey, you. What's your name?" He quietly asked one of the owlets, who turned around and… I don't even know what was wrong with it. I don't even know where to begin. If I thought Leon was looking a bit too skinny, than this owlet was skirting the edges between life and death. I know that we didn't have food for everyone, but this was too much. Its feathers were frayed, and damaged, like they weren't fully grown. And then I noticed that not only were its feathers unusually thin and coarse, but that it was missing feathers in a lot of different places on its body. Almost like someone was forcefully ripping them off.

This, I believe, all paled in comparison to what I thought was the worst thing that was wrong with him. His eyes weren't a color that belonged to his species, which were usually yellow, or orange, no, it was a dull, lifeless gray. He was staring at us vacantly, and I was unnerved by his appearance. It's like he wasn't there, mentally.

 _It's like that one saying I read from a story that had those mysterious Others in it. The lights are on, but there's nobody home._

"What's your name, kid?" Leon questioned the owlet, who creepily gave an empty answer.

"4-32"

"Okay, 4-32, I want you… to go right over there, see it?" Leon pointed to a space away from the others. The owlet nodded, and started to walk to a lone large stone. It was at that point that I had to wonder what the barred owl's plan was.

"Leon, what are you doing?" I worriedly questioned, although he gave me a disappointing answer.

"Just wait, Anna." He follows the owlet, and we do the same. The child remained as still as a spire, a blank look on its face.

"4-32, I order you to… smash your head on that stone right there. Don't stop until I tell you to."

 _What the? Why?! Surely he wouldn't do it, right?!_

"Leon, what the hag are you doing?!" I was sorely confused and bewildered at his command. Liz could not speak, only looking at us with wide eyes.

"Just wait." He coldly told us, and before I knew it, the owlet had started to do exactly what he wanted him to do. Practically no hesitation, no nothing. He just started to headbutt the rock. I wanted to stop the owlet from hurting himself anymore, yet Leon blocked me with his body. "You can't stop him yet, Anna! You need to see this."

"Liz, stop him, now!" I commanded my friend. Leon didn't stop her, but as soon as she began to hold the owlet back from harming himself anymore, the child had shockingly pushed her down to the ground with a force that belonged to someone who definitely wasn't a week old.

"What the?" I gazed at the horrific sight, my beak gaping in horror. The owlet just kept slamming his head down on the stone. Blood was soon pouring out of his nostrils, and I saw a bit of his beak chipped off, clicking on the ground. The owlet didn't give up, didn't stop at all. The blood just kept coming out.

"Leon! Stop him, for Glaux's sake, Stop him!" I pleaded to the barred owl, who thankfully intervened and told the owlet to cease his self mutilation.

"You see this, Anna? This is what they do to owlets." A rivulet of blood slowly runs down the face of the owlet, yet there was nothing that indicated that it was actually in pain. That it could actually feel pain.

"Mindless slaves, made to serve your every whim until the end of time. And it's all because of that damned moon. And your damned… _family_."


	12. Chapter 12:The Truth

Chapter 12: The Truth

"How?" I had no idea that they could have been doing this to… all of the pickers. How could the moon, of all things, be responsible for this? How could my family, the ones that saved me from death, condemn others to a fate that was worse than death?

"Don't ask me how. You should instead ask, why?" He plainly answered. "Why would the Pure Ones need obedient slaves? Why would they erase everything that makes a person, and only leave the most important parts behind?"

"They… so they couldn't have anyone arguing. So that they wouldn't have to deal with an insurrection or rebellion, right?" Liz spoke up, her voice was like someone had done the same thing to her.

"Ding ding ding ding, you're correct! They get the best deal that they could ever want. They don't have to worry about living conditions, food and water, nothing. When they eventually expire, they just get a new batch of fresh owlets and start the process all over again! Isn't that just the best?"

"This isn't a joke, Leon! This is frinking children we're talking about here! Aren't you the least bit unsettled about this?" I refused to believe that he could be nonchalant about this.

"Oh believe me, I was as shocked as you were when I found out. It got me asking all these questions that you must be making right now. I suppose I'm… just becoming numb to this."

"So you don't care about them, is that it?" I accusingly glared at the barred owl, who started to become forlorn.

"I do care, it's just that, well, If we even shared the ideas in our heads, they'd _kill_ us. I really want to save these kids, but I don't know where to even start."

"You don't know that. Maybe I can talk to somebody, and they could stop this madness. There's gotta be someone in here who shares our plight."

"Trust me, Anna, the only person who truly gives a damn about any of this is Frazier. And even he can't fix this absolute cesspool of a mess."

"Well, I'm going to talk to him. I want to know for certain, that everything that you're saying is indeed true."

"Are you just suggesting that so that he can tell you that everything will be alright?" I let out a small growl in anger.

"That's only a small part of the reason, Leon. I need to hear what he has to say about this."

"Fine, I'll stick around here for a little while longer before I go home. Do what you gotta do, Anna." He turns around and noiselessly flaps his wings and periodically flies up higher and higher to the canyons walls. I sigh, the waves of anxiety washing itself over me.

"Hey Anna, no matter what happens, I got your back, alright?" Liz says, and I sadly smile at her commitment to our friendship. She was always like that, though, willing to defend me with her life if need be. I admired her for that, she made me feel like I was actually worth something, worth protecting. They all did that, in their own ways.

"Thanks, Liz. I just need some space right now, okay?"

"No problem, I'll go on and tell our instructors that you got hurt at practice today, who knows, maybe they won't wring our necks out to dry."

"I doubt it."

"Yeah, you're probably right. See you soon?" She asked.

"Maybe." I muttered.

"Don't be so negative, that's my job, Anna." She smirked at her joke, and as much as I wanted to ignore her little jest, I churred a bit anyway. We parted ways, and I could not be bothered to stalk around anymore. If they want to yell at me or hit me, I don't care anymore. Aside from a few passing glances, I was virtually ignored as I made my way to the infirmary. At least I could be alone in my thoughts for a bit.

 _Why wasn't I affected by the moon? I was a picker for a couple weeks before I could train as a soldier. How long has this been going on? Is there a way to reverse this curse that was befallen upon the other owlets?_

 _What else had they been lying about?_

I entered the medical facility with a heavy heart, and I desperately hoped that he would be in here. I could not bear to carry these thoughts and worries for any longer. It took some time, fruitlessly searching for the man, and I was beginning to grow tired and frustrated. It seemed that he wasn't around, and I immediately started to lash out at anything I saw.

I raked at a nearby black stalagmite, my talons barely indenting the tough material, but at a price. I cried out in pain, but I didn't stop my assault. Even when my leg grew bloodied and battered from the numerous impacts, I kept going. I began to rip apart one of the beds on the ground, a relatively easier task without much risk for injury. I didn't stop for anything. I grabbed a glass container from a stone table, and threw it on the wall with all my might. It shattered instantly when it made contact, exposing its contents to the outside world. A few slimy grotesque creatures fall down to the ground, and while they were busy writhing on the floor, I slammed my foot down, _hard_ , on one of them.

The disgusting worm kept moving, even after I stomped on it a few more times, which for some reason infuriated me. I let out a short scream of irritation, and I collapsed into another bed. I began to wail and screech into the nest, a few tear drops managing to escape from my eyes. I kept the rest in check, but as soon as I heard a familiar voice, I couldn't keep them from leaving any longer.

"Anna? What are you doing here, sweetie?"

I shot up from the bed, and instantaneously sprinted to the eagle owl. I quickly closed the gap, and let everything out when I embraced the man. I cried and cried, the river rapids had been opened once more. I don't how long I kept crying, but in the midst of my sorrow filled weeping, he attempted to ask me something.

"There there, it's okay. I'm here, baby girl, there's no need for any more tears, Alright?" He said reassuringly, and I choked up on some more while he spoke. "Can you tell me what happened?"

"Le, Le, Leon tried to-" I said between heaving gasps of air. "He tried to…" Frazier interjected, getting the wrong message.

"Oh my Glaux, lass, I knew I shouldn't have trusted that conniving little wet pooper! Did he hurt you? Cause I swear, if he did-"

"No, that's, not what happened. Frazier, he wanted me to… see. See what happened to pickers. What we do to them. Great Glaux, did… did you know about this?" I sobbed, and for a second, he didn't have any kind of reaction. Like he was lost in thought or something. And then, he finally understood what I meant.

"Oh, sweetie. I'm sorry, so _terribly_ sorry. I should have told you much sooner, but I, I was afraid."

"Afraid? Why were you afraid?" It's hard to imagine Frazier, one of the biggest and strongest owls I know, was scared of something.

"I was afraid that you might… not come out of it in one piece if I said anything about it. I didn't want you to see, I didn't want you have that awful image stuck in your head. And now, there's nothing I can do to get rid of it for you."

"Why, Frazier? Why would the Pure Ones lie to me, why would _you,_ lie to me? I thought you all cared about me. Cared about everyone. Why would they _ever_ do something like that?" The eagle owl takes in a deep breath, and slowly exhales.

"You might want to sit down for this, lass." He told me, and then he noticed my new injury. Some of the blood had coagulated, yet I knew that he wouldn't be satisfied with that. "Anna, it seems like every time you visit me, you come in with a new scar on you. I'll get a bandage and some leeches, and you just rest on that bed over there, okay?" He escorts me to one of the closest nests, and goes to fetch his medical supplies. I hoped that he would not see the broken glass on the floor, but I'm usually not that lucky anyway. Besides, it wouldn't take a genius sleuth to see the mess I made.

He quickly comes back into the main room, with a handful of blood suckers and a small roll of cloth. He instantly gets to work, placing a few of the leeches on the spots where my wound still bled, and then he started to speak again, while we waited for them to soak up the rest.

"So, you know what we do to pickers, correct?" I nodded. "However, you don't know all of the logistics behind _how_ we do it, yes?"

"No, but Leon said that the moon does something to them that makes them the way they are."

"The lad's not wrong at all about that, Anna. They all told you that pickers would have to sleep during the night, and at first, you were included in that sleep pattern as well. It does indeed does something to their mind when they sleep underneath the moon. It's a process called moon-blinking, and as the owlets are continuously subjected to it each and every night, they slowly begin to forget their memories, their drives, until everything that makes an owl a person, is gone. It's why I personally arranged for your promotion, It took a lot of time, bribery, and more favors than I can count, but you needed to get out of there as soon as possible. To be honest, it's a miracle that you didn't lose your own mind when you were out there with the rest."

 _I guess I assumed that the owlets with me didn't usually speak because they were tired, or something. But, maybe I did always knew. Maybe Leon was right. I always had a choice, and I chose to lie to myself, while they lied to me._

"Wait, you were responsible for my promotion? I thought that I earned it, fair and square."

"Lass, let's be perfectly honest here, you're not good soldier material. You ask too many questions, and you don't have a mean bone in your body. The two things that Pure Ones despise. Weakness, and curiosity."

"But, I'm not weak, am I?" How could he say something like that? I wasn't a weakling, I know I'm not one.

"You aren't lass, I should have worded that better. What I meant was that you simply don't _want_ to fight. You'd rather be here with me, reading books and helping the wounded, correct?"

"Yeah, I guess I do. I like to read, and to help others, caring for them when they need it the most. Is that bad?"

"Not at all. It's just that most of our peers don't particularly share that sentiment. They'd rather inflict pain and misery, rather than cure it. They'd rather burn books than keep them. It's part of the reason why we are looked down upon. But that's not the full picture. It goes deeper than that."

 _Deeper than this? What does he mean?_

"What are you talking about?" I asked.

"Have you never wondered why some Pure Ones look at you with disgust? Like you're less than a speck of dirt upon their cold iron helmets? You must have heard one or two of them that talked to you like you were a parasite. Like you were nothing."

Now that I thought about it, There were soldiers, as well as my instructors, that seemed to either completely ignore my presence, or make it quite clear that they didn't like me that much. At first, I surmised that it must have been because of my age, or my skill, but now I wasn't so sure.

"I never really bothered to notice, but yeah, I think I might have seen something like that."

"Let me tell you why, Anna. It's because Pure Ones have a very distinct philosophy, a way of life, and we are at the very bottom of it. There's only one species of owls that they truly care about, and they are the Tytos. And not those grass owls, or the sooty owls, but the Tyto Albas. Everyone else is expendable."

 _It made way more sense, yet that didn't make it any better for me. To know that Frazier, Liz, and myself, were treated differently all because of our species? Glaux, there was this time where my friend was harshly scolded and… made an example in front of everyone, but I had always thought it was because she was acting like a brat. To know that those tears that were shed, the blood that was spilled, was really because of something she couldn't control?_

 _That I couldn't control? That's… horrible._

The eagle owl procedurally removes every leech from my open wound with a heated metal rod, and then he covers it up with the clean bandage. He continues to speak while I morbidly ponder about all the other times we had been insulted and discriminated against.

"You ever wonder how I became a healer for the Pure Ones?" He questioned, although he didn't let me answer him. "It wasn't because I was good at healing others. It was because I was one of the few people who even bothered to care for the wounded at all. Everyone and their mother were too busy researching different ways to kill somebody, making the orders for the soldiers who would take the lives of our 'enemies', I was the _one_ man who willingly volunteered for the job. Seeing as how almost nobody else would do it, I was given this place. And to rub salt in the giant gaping claw mark, I was given just the bare minimum tools that I required to save my patients."

"So, all of this, all the supplies here, you found them all?"

"While I did find the leeches up in a lake in Ambala, most of what you see here, I made with my bare talons. Although most Pure Ones try their best to avoid my clinic, it's either getting treated well by a lowly Strigidae, or going to the other more, old-fashioned medics on the other side of Aegolius. Anyways, I think you've heard enough about the sins the Pure Ones commit on a nightly basis for now." He narrows his eyes at me in disapproval. "I know you were angry, and rightfully so, but that was the last jar of leeches that I had. You're lucky I love you, you know that?" I awkwardly rubbed my bad leg with my talons.

"I know, I'm trying to get better with my emotions, honestly. I'm sorry for ruining your nest and breaking your glass." I hung my head low to the ground in shame, but in a familiar motion, he slowly lifted my chin back up.

"Don't frown, Anna. I would have done the same thing."

"FRAZIER!" A voice shouts out from the entrance to the infirmary. I didn't move from the bed, in fear of the pain that would follow, yet I knew who the voice belonged to. A large horned owl with red face paint comes in the room, dragging with him a single owlet. "You've got another idgit who managed to sprink up his beak pretty bad. You'll probably have to euthanize the little bugger."

 _Glaux, it's 4-32! He looks even worse, how is that remotely possible?!_

"Unfortunately, I'm under oath to not intentionally kill my patients, Jatt. If you want an executioner, go look for Damion. I'm sure he would appreciate the chance for a decapitation." Frazier acerbically told the horned owl. Jatt scoffs at the remark.

"I'm pretty sure he specializes in the… art of persuasion, so to speak. Oh, and after your little protege recovers, she'll be assigned to either another day patrol or night patrol, not sure what they said, didn't really pay attention."

"That's fine, Jatt. She understands, don't you, Anna?" I pretended to smile, and thankfully the owl was too dim to figure out that I had no plans to do any kind of labor for the Pure Ones.

"Alright, well, I gotta go see an owlet with his laughter therapy, make sure he's still breathing and all." He left us to our own devices, and Frazier ushered the owlet to another bed. He lies the owlet on his back, and I asked him another question.

"What's laughter therapy?" I had heard of a couple soldiers talk vaguely about it, yet I had no idea what it was. It sounded quite nice, unlike everything else I've come to known about this St. Aggies.

"It's best if you didn't know, Anna. I'll only tell you that moon-blinking is a better alternative than it."

 _So, what's the point in calling it therapy if it's apparently worse than literal brainwashing? Is it just a sick joke they made for their own amusement?_

Frazier turns his attention to the owlet in a supine position. "Glaux, half of this poor kid's beak is just… gone. I can see the bloody bone, I couldn't imagine how much pain he's in." The eagle owl was genuinely appalled and disgusted at the state he was in.

"I thought that they couldn't feel pain though. Isn't it one of the effects of moon-blinking?" I inquired, and Frazier shook his head.

"They might not look like it, but trust me, their body's crying out for someone to listen. To help them through this trying time. And I intend to do just that." He walks over to the stone table and retrieves a small brown nut, filled with an unknown liquid. "This will sterilize the wound, prevent an infection from occurring." He holds the nut in his beak, and he was very cautious not to drop it.

"Frazier, I've never seen you use that… thing before. What exactly is it?" I asked, curiously. He lets go of the nut, and leaves it next to 4-32.

"This nut contains a strong mixture of chemicals that are similar in function to what the others called, Alcohol. The plant that produces this nut only grows in certain conditions, and is mostly found in the Shadow Forest. That's why you haven't seen me use any of it before tonight. It's rare, and it's a hassle to stockpile it."

"What's the plant called?"

"Vitalitätswurzel. I think it's a fitting name, for a strange, exotic location that has trees taller and wider than anything in Ambala."

 _Sure, for him it's fitting. I have no clue about what that means._

He grasps the nut with his talons, and slowly, the liquid inside was seeping out and onto the remnants of the owlet's beak. No reaction could have been seen. It was weird, but I think I heard the sound of fizzing whenever Frazier poured the nut's fluid.

"Now, like our 'great king', this owlet's beak will obviously never grow back. The best thing I can do is to simply keep the site protected from the elements, with a small amount of cloth wrapped around it. Hopefully, it won't become infected, but I'll keep a close eye on him to make sure everything goes well. He'll have to be fed manually until he fully acclimates to the change. Anna, I don't suppose you know how this could have happened, do you?"

"Actually, I do. When I told you that Leon wanted to make me see what Pure Ones do to pickers, he… ordered this owlet to smash his head on a rock, made me watch this owlet mutilate himself. I understand why he did it, but that doesn't make any less wrong."

"That is most certainly true, and while I tend to abstain playing hagsfiend's advocate, you probably didn't make it any easier for him. The lad is a firm believer in the mentality of 'the end justifies the means', and knowing how stubborn you are, you must have made him feel like he was stuck in a corner with no way out other than… that." His eyes wandered over to the blank faced owlet.

"I'm going to whoop his tail feathers when I get out of here, if that's alright with you." I suggested, and he churred for a second.

"Anna, you don't need my permission to kick someone's arse. If you wanna do it, then just do it. You have quite the good reason for doing so, anyway." He begins to tie the rest of the bandage that he brought on the owlet's open wound. "After I'm done with him, I'm going to give him a heavy dosage of sedatives. It forces the body to start repairing any damage that was inflicted upon it. Also, it makes it so that the brain won't send off any signals that are responsible for the feeling of pain."

"You don't want him to suffer, do you?" I asked, and he barely nods in affirmation.

"There's already too much suffering in the world as of tonight, and there will be more and more as the days and nights go by. If I can relieve even one person of their burdens, then my gizzard will rest quietly, satisfied with the decision I made. For a time, at the very least." He unknowingly puffs his chest feathers up in his rather uplifting speech, and stretches his wings out to nearly their full length. As soon as he notices that I was staring at him, he immediately deflates.

 _Um, what?_ _Why?_

"Frazier, is there something wrong with your feathers or something? Did you forget to preen tonight?" It was a strange situation to be in. I was now the skeptical and disapproving one in the relationship.

"No, lass, It's um, how do I say this without making it incredibly awkward? Do you know why our feathers either fluff up or wilf at certain moments?"

"Yeah, I suppose. For example, we wilf whenever we get scared, is that one of the reasons why?"

"Yes, and there are a few others. If we feel threatened, or angered at something or someone, our feathers will bristle and make us appear like we are twice the size we normally are. In a survival situation, it can effectively trap a majority of our body heat from escaping. And, it can be used to… let's say this, help attract a desirable mate to us. I may have done that very thing in front of you."

"Wait a second, are you saying that _you_ wanted to be my mate?"

"No, that's exactly what I was fearful of! I didn't want you to get the wrong idea or anything, Glaux, I'm an complete idiot." He slaps himself in the face with his wing, and I jumped at the chance to tease him.

"Oh, now I get it!" I exclaim. "Wow, Frazier, has it been that long without a woman in your life that you wanted a girl like me? I mean, all you had to do was ask. I'll be a hag of a lot better than most of the women in here. And I-"

"Okay, we're not continuing this conversation anymore. I should have kept my beak shut. I give you an inch, and you want to take five frinking miles!"

"I mean, you technically did raise me and all. I learned from the best." I smugly smirked at the flustered eagle owl.

 _Seeing Frazier fumble with his words was the best. It kind of made me almost forget about all the terrible things I had learned this day. Key word being "almost"._

"Alright, and since I did raise you and took you into my wings, you can help me with the little mess you made. Think of it as, reparations for the damages you caused." He returned a sly grin at me, and I grumbled under my breath. "And, when your finished, I'll tell you about something else that you should have known a long time ago."

"What is it?" I sweetly asked, putting on my pouty face, but he would not give in until I did what he wanted me to do.

"Quit stalling, and you'll know what it is." He cooes, and rubs the top of my head. He then goes back to the owlet to finish treating him. The pain in my leg was undoubtedly better than it was whenever he first came in here, although I made sure that I didn't strain myself while cleaning up the broken bits of glass. It was irksome to pick up every single shard, but I was determined to find out what he wanted to talk about. He didn't tell me where to put them, so I merely threw the shards outside. Hopefully, one of the guards would step on it. It's not like they don't deserve it.

After awhile of the menial task that he assigned me, I was pretty confident that I had gotten rid of most of the broken glass. Frazier opens the owlet's beak, and gives the owlet a sort of thick, viscous medicine that must have been the sedatives he was talking about. It didn't take long for the owlet to close its eyes and fall asleep. The eagle owls gestures to follow him, and I walk next to him, as we head inside his sleeping quarters.

I've been in his room before, it's nothing too special or anything. He has a few books lying on his own nest in a heap, one of them was opened, showing a diagram of the body of an owl.

"Doing some day time reading, are we?" I snidely questioned the eagle owl.

"You know me, can't keep a book down if my life depended on it. But that's not want I wanted to talk about. Now, what I'm going to say, and the things I'm going to show you, I want you to promise me that you keep your mouth shut. That means that you can't go blabbing off to your friends about this, you understand?"

"But, I-" I said, and then he interrupted my trail of thought.

"Anna, this is very serious. The things I'm going to disclose to you are for you alone. I can't risk giving out information like this to Liz and Leon, not yet, anyways. Their hearts are in the right place, but I can't trust them to keep this to themselves. You understand me?"

"Yes, sir." I unenthusiastically answered.

"Speak up, lass. I'm afraid I'm going deaf, and you need to repeat that for my withered ears."

"Sir yes sir!" I raised my volume, and he belts out a hearty guffaw.

"That-a-girl. Now, do you see that little nook over there?" He points to a corner in the room, with a hidden crack on the bottom of the stone wall. I nod, and he continues. "Go ahead and get down on your back and get your talons inside. I would do it myself, but I'm not as flexible as you are."

I do as I'm instructed, and I go over to the spot. I was kinda scared that I might anger a spider who was hiding in there, but thankfully, there was no arachnid around. As my good leg goes further into the dark hole, I feel the strange sensation of what seemed to be… leather? If I didn't read those two books Frazier had that were made by Others, I wouldn't know what the material was. I close my talons around the weird and rough object, and when I pulled it out, I discovered that it was another book. Yet, there was no cover on it.

"Frazier, what is this?" I inquired, and he took the book from my talons and put in on the stone table he had in his room.

"Have you ever heard of the, 'Legends of the Guardians?'"


	13. Chapter 13:Recovery

Chapter 13: Recovery

The first thing I felt when I finally broke free from my slumber, was a consistent, aching pain throughout my body. My eyes didn't open immediately, but I don't need those to feel like shit. There was a burning sensation rising in my throat, and it wasn't long before I started to cough, and the pain just got worse as I continued to retch out my lungs. I heard the shuffling of feet move closer to me, and then I heard a reassuring voice speak to me. Even in my tired, drained and weakened state, I couldn't forget something like the face behind its words. _His_ words.

"Don't worry, Alex. You'll feel better after I give you this. Can you open up and say 'ah'?" He asked, and while it was incredibly difficult, I managed to at least somewhat give him an answer.

"Aaa, Aaaaa,Huh." My beautifully crafted response made the owl giggle.

"I'll take that as a yes. Keep that beak open, bud, this'll be over before you know it." He said, and almost immediately after he did, I tasted a horrible liquid that ran down my throat like a thick slush made of toothpaste and cheap wine. It wasn't good, at all. I'm assuming it was a type of medicine, yet it only made me hack out more junk that was stuck in my lungs instead.

"I know it tastes bad, but it'll stop the coughing, I promise." To make it evidently clear how terrible it was, I may have exaggerated the severity of my condition. A teeny tiny bit, I assure you. Probably… maybe.

"I… ate, yu." I croaked out, and I was surprised at how awful my voice was. I think Matt was too, because he put a wing over my mouth, shushing me.

"Alex, just stop talking, please. I know it's very hard to keep your mouth shut, but right now you should be quiet. They didn't see it at first, but some of the ice in that storm almost sliced open your throat. It's going to take some time, but would you rather have no voice at all?" He questioned, and I mustered all the energy I could to shake my head. Matt's seriousness on the matter was more than enough to silence me. I'd be a complete dunce to continue trying to talk.

 _I know I was fucked up, but I didn't know I was THAT fucked up._

"Good. Now, can you open your eyes?" He quired, and while it seemed like my eyes had been glued shut for weeks, I did eventually do what he requested. I could only see blurry shapes and colors, but that didn't matter. It would come back sooner or later.

"Glaux, wow… your eyes are, umm, I don't know how to explain this properly, but there's some blood moving around in them." My vision wasn't getting better yet, but I still saw the fuzzy image of another owl coming to us.

"It's called a broken blood vessel. It can happen for a variety of different reasons. Vomiting, straining your muscles past their limits, or even a simple sneeze can cause the vessel in your eyes to rupture." The unknown third person in the room informed the screech owl. "Are you taking notes, Matthias? No spoilers intended, but this might be on the next test in a few nights."

"Not really, Mirah. I was more concerned with my friend's well-being. I'm sorry, you've told me that in this line of work, we shouldn't be so emotionally invested in the lives of our patients. I guess I just can't detach myself like that." He responded, the brown figure's head lowered down in sadness. I couldn't blame him, I'm his friend. I know it would be hard for me to do something like that if he was in my position.

"I might have said that, but locking up your emotions could one night lead you to breakdown in the middle of an operation, and you might lose the patient because you refused to seek treatment for your woes. Mental health is just as important as physical health." The new woman, who was Matthias's… teacher? She tapped his back, gently escorting him away. "I know you're worried, but you haven't even eaten tweener yet. I'll look after him while you're gone, alright?"

"Fine, fine." He dejectedly agreed, and suddenly the brown blur ran right back up to me and nearly cannonballed me. "I'm glad you're finally awake, Alex. Maybe some night, I can show you around the tree. I think you'll like it." I simply imagined the huge smile on his face, and it warmed my soul.

Matthias exits the room, leaving me alone with the owl named Mirah. She strides over to me, and it was at that point that my vision was beginning to return to me. I discovered that she had those two small tufts of feathers that mimicked the appearance of wolf's ears, and was without a doubt, taller and thicker than me. She's not fat, God forbid you ever say that to _any_ woman, yet she's not twiggy either. I don't know, feathers make everything confusing.

"You still with us?" The owl questions, taking me out of my observational mind. I nodded my head. "Good. Now that you're conscious, we're going to have to take things slow. Your body has slightly atrophied from disuse, and needs time to rebuild its strength. What I want from you tonight, is for you to reach that croft over there, you see it?" She points to a nest that wasn't on the other side of the room, but it was far enough that it would certainly prove a challenge for me. Since I was getting bored of responding using just my head, I wanted to try something new. It was difficult to use my talons from my position, sitting down on the ground, yet I tried to tell her I wanted the nearby piece of parchment on a nearby natural… table.

"I'm sorry, what are you trying to say?"She wondered out loud, and I contemplated hitting myself in the face, before I made a writing motion with my talons. Then I pointed back to the paper. I repeated the movements for a few times, and then her eyes lit up, and she recognized what the gesture meant. "Oh, you want to talk with this?" She held up the piece of paper, and I gave her a "Dude, you're so retarded" look on my face. She groans at my lovely charm.

"Why am I always stuck with the smart arses? Here," She hands me the paper, along with a small roll of charcoal. "Just tell me what you want to say."

It hurt to keep my hold on on the pencil, but it wasn't that bad. In fact, It was actually quite relieving, a return to normality in this messed up world. I even drew a tiny frowny face to accentuate my case.

"I feel like shit." I plainly inscribed upon the sepia tone parchment. Mirah, for some really odd reason, craned her neck to the left, staring at what I wrote like it was the most interesting thing I had ever written in my life. But then I realized something.

 _I don't think any of them understand English._

"Um, Alex, do you know how to write Hoolian? Because I have never seen that language before." She was clearly stumped at this intriguing piece of literature, which was in hindsight, both hilarious and depressing at the same time. However, that wouldn't stop me from trying to establish a method of communication. I quickly drew a rough, and pretty terrible looking raccoon face, and then a couple droplets of rain. I then pointed to myself, and then the mammal, and finally to the water.

"You, you're a wet raccoon?" She asked, and I energetically shook my head. "You're going to clean a raccoon?" "It's going to rain raccoons?" Jesus, take the wheel, it's getting harder and harder to resist the urge to strangle the ignorant owl. "Oh, oh! You feel like racdrops, now I get it!" She began to chuckle at my amazing art, and if my throat wasn't incredibly dry and irritated, I would have congratulated her for her skill at deduction. Seriously, I'd do it, with my own talons, of course.

"I bet you probably do, Alex. But sitting here all night long won't help you. How about this, for now, I want you to just get up on your feet, and walk a couple steps. If you can't do it by yourself, you can lean on me for support. Is that acceptable to your standards, your gracefulness?" She tries (and fails) to silence herself from churring at her "joke", and I think I could have launched my eyeballs into orbit with the amount of cringe I had witnessed. I lazily wrote down a response on the paper.

"Fuck you." The legibility was nearly childlike, but I made my case clear, and that's what matters. Like before, she couldn't understand what I wrote.

"You had better said, 'Okay, Mirah, love you too'." She helps prop me up on my feet, and then I understood how a tree felt in a storm. My legs seemed to be comprised of nothing but jello and very thin pine wood, but thankfully, she kept up her end of the bargain. She wraps her wing around my shoulder, and then we start to slowly, and deliberately walk forward.

"There we go. I have to say, you are doing a _lot_ better than some of other patients here. Most of them would take a single step and fall down face first on the ground." In my peripheral, I could see the sides of her beak curl up in a small grin. "Matthias did say that you acted like a, quote unquote 'complete bad-arse', after your fight with those crows."

 _Matthias, swearing? How could I miss something like that?_

We had nearly made it to the next bed when my legs finally gave out from the pressure. A strong burning pain ran through my lower limbs, and in my head, I distinctly recalled the voice of a lumberjack as he topples a tree down.

" _Timber!_

Mirah swiftly reacts to my blunder, and catches me in her wings like an avian safety net. The air in my lungs escaped through my mouth, and I let out a short gasp of pain and shock. As I pretend to channel my inner steel anchor spirit guide, she calmly lies me back down on the bed.

"There you go, now that wasn't so bad, was it?" She rhetorically asks me, and I grabbed the owlish pencil and paper with my beak, and I held the charcoal bundle with both of my talons and drew a _big_ frowny face on it. She churred at the awe- awful artwork. "Alex, it's fortunate that we have some spare parchment for you to doodle on. I'll have to ask Ezylryb for some more when I go to the library tonight."

 _Ezylryb, huh. Why am I still expecting normal names like Richard or John? Wait a second, they have a library?_

"Yes, Alex, we have a library. I've seen that look of intrigue on every owlet that comes here, it never changes too much from person to person. We can make that a goal, if you want to. By the end of the week, you should be able to get there, _without_ too much of my help, you got me?" I rapidly nodded my head up and down, before she continued. "Good. Now, are you up for some more walking?"

I knew that speaking my mind out loud was a huge no-no for Matthias and Mirah, but in my defense, I had temporarily forgotten that rule.

"Nah 'eealy… Ma'dum." She instantaneously smacked me upside the head, not too hard as to reopen my wounds, but enough to make me think about how stupid I was.

"Alex, are you daft? What did Matthias say? You can't go around talking for at least five nights, maybe even more!" She scolded me like I was a little kid, and out of anger and frustration, I then said something I knew I was going to regret later down the line.

"Nah I 'Om!" I loudly rasped in her face, and I began to harshly cough from the overuse of my voice. She hits my back with a strong force that reminded me of an improvised version of chest therapy. She repeated the action for awhile, and when it seemed like she was done, she gave me another good smack to my head.

 _She acts like my mom did whenever I interrupted her freaking nap time!_

"Glaux, I knew Matthias warned me about this, but I have never, in my life, known someone as stubborn as you! Now, can you just please keep your beak shut? Or do you want a free trip to Glaumora instead?" She directly threatened to me, glaring with those wrinkled, but fiery yellow eyes. Any man or woman, after seeing that look in someone's eyes, would know when to quit. And I was no different. I gulped, and zipped my mouth shut, shaking my head. She sighs, evidently relieved that I had learned my lesson.

"Alex, you really know how to push someone _past_ their breaking point, you know that?" She tiredly asks, and went up to a small table to get what appeared to be a small nut. She hands it to me, and I turned my head quizzically. "It's just water, Alex. I'm not trying to poison you or anything. I'd be out of the job in an instant if I did."

I hold the strange unorthodox container, and I proceed to gingerly sip on the cold liquid within. It was good, sorta tasted like well water without the risk of cholera and other parasites attached to it. It soothes my scratchy throat as it runs down my esophagus. The meager sips that I initially took quickly turned into big gulps, and I was soon finished with the "cup" of water. I wipe my beak with my free right wing, and I felt a bit rejuvenated from the hydration.

"That reminds me," Mirah says, eyeing my other wing. "How do you feel about massages?"

 _Massages? I guess I'm okay with them, if that's what she asking about._

I shrug my shoulders, wordlessly telling her that I wouldn't object to them.

"Good, good. Since you can't fly for now, we'll have to make sure that blood is being properly circulated through your wings. Get rid of those bothersome knots and aches you have." Her head suddenly swivels behind her, (Yes, it's still creepy to see that) and we both noticed someone new that had entered the room. Her body turns around, and the newcomer comes closer to us. The owl was brown and white-feathered, and immensely tiny. Like, shorter than Matthias, and that was a tremendous accomplishment. Like Mirah's, its eyes were a shade of bright yellow.

"Matron Mirah, I think I require your assistance right now." The little stranger's voice was equally puny, and dripping with anxiety.

"What do you want, Ventas? I thought I told you that if one more owl comes here spouting off about their mysterious 'illnesses' that for some reason disappear without a trace, then I'd-"

"No, Mirah, it's not about that," Ventas interjects. "One of the owlets burned their talons with Bubo, do we have some white willow bark leftover from the trip in Cape Glaux?"

"I think so, check inside there." She pointed to a small chest, and the little owl starts to dig inside its bowels. He eventually finds what he was looking for, and Mirah goes over to him and grabs another nut and a small bag. She returns back to me, and informs me of the situation.

"Alright Alex, duty calls. I don't know when I'll be back, but please don't go looking for me. If you're up to it, you can continue your exercises while I'm gone. Just don't push yourself, you hear me?" I nodded. "Great, Ventas, let's go." The little owl walks side by side with her, and they leave me alone in the room.

Now that everything was quiet and calm, I could be by myself in my thoughts. I've never thought about it, but I'm really in the Tree of Ga''Hoole. All those stories Soren shared during our time in Aggies, the literal concentration camp for children, they were all true. And it sucks _so much_ that I'm stuck in this frinking room for who knows how long. I assume it's an infirmary for injured birds like myself, yet that raises even more questions for me.

If these Guardians are capable of maintaining a form of equilibrium in this tree, this sanctuary for the lost and broken, then does that mean that they actually have a stable form of government? What kind of government do they have? Is it like how England was in ye olden times, where the king's rule was absolute? Or is it more modern in design, where both the monarch and the people can vote on certain issues? Do they even have a monarch, or is it a democracy instead?

I wanted to ask more questions, yet I knew that I wouldn't get the answers right away. My ability to share my wonderful opinions and thoughts on things to others had been severely hindered by my injuries. I could learn this Hoolian, but from what I remember back at the hoarder's hollow, it was basically chicken scratch. It was like how Asian languages looked when written, but somehow even more complicated than that. Although, maybe I'm just stupid. That's a definite possibility.

With nothing else to do except daydream, or stare at a wall for all eternity, I started to fall asleep. The dream world soon became the new reality, but there was nothing around me. The ever present darkness that had followed me greeted me, and when I peered down, I saw that I was no longer a human anymore. I was an owl. Should this scare me? Is it bad if it doesn't anymore?

" **Hey, Dick!"** Someone crudely shouts in my ear, and I almost jump straight into the air out of pure shock. I fall down in a heap on the invisible ground. I slowly gaze up, and I saw a very angry Daniel, staring down at me condescendingly. All of my questions would have to wait.

"Uh, hello?" I meekly stated, trying in vain to make the conversation more civil. The silver owl shoots daggers into my skull and pierces them straight out the other side.

" **You fucking asshole! How fucking dare you try to downplay your glaux damned situation in front of me! How the Hag could you lie to me, lie to everyone you know that you were almost dead! I knew you were in bad shape, but you never told me that you were flirting with the sprinking Grim Reaper!"** The owl's blue eyes were steadily changing colors, much to my horror. His dark blue eyes were almost a deep crimson red. I was practically frozen in fear as he continued to brutally attack me with his words.

" **You had everyone worried, Alex. They thought that you were going to die, I thought you were going to die! And you know what the worst part was? Matthias almost died because of you. Because of me."**

"What the Hag are you talking about?! Where is this shit coming from, Daniel!?" I furiously yelled back at the Tyto. How in the blue fuck am I responsible for something like that?

" **Matthias can see me. He heard my grief, came outside to listen to me. And then he… he couldn't stay awake any longer."** His eyes began to lose the red hot fire within them, returning to their original color. " **I watched as he fell down into the sea below. And I was completely powerless to stop it from happening."** He started to tear up, his voice becoming more and more desolate and forlorn. " **I'm sorry. I shouldn't be blaming you for that. But, do you understand why I'm so angry with you? You made everyone worry. After that incident, Matthias watched as you slept. Every single night, he was by your side. He became the protector that you always were. But then he wouldn't eat, he started skipping his lessons, he barely got in any sleep at all. And it was all for you."**

"Racdrops, I didn't know any of that. He really did all that for me?"

" **You don't have to ask me that. He'd go to the ends of the earth if it meant that your life could be saved."**

"Jesus Christ, I, words can't begin to describe just how sorry I am. I just, I just wanted them to be safe, you know? I figured that if I could take the shit hand the world dealt to us, then maybe... I don't know. I guess I never really knew how much I meant to them." My words rang true, as I did want to shelter the two from the storm. All this time, I had put their safety, their lives above mine. When in reality, I was just as important to them, as they were to me.

" **They're not your friends anymore, Alex. They're more than that."**

"I know."

" **I… I hope that you realize just how important you are to them. How important you are to me."**

"Hmmm, I think I'm starting to." I couldn't help but make a dumb joke, in an attempt to lighten the mood.

He cracks a minute grin. " **Has anyone ever said to you that you're an asshole, as well as an idiot?"**

"Dozens, perhaps , Can you forgive me? I won't be mad if you don't."

" **Why wouldn't I? I love you too much to still be angry with you. Do you wanna…?"**

"Bring it in, you goofball." I reach my wings out to the owl, and we embrace. We remain like that for awhile, the darkness was our only witness.

 _ **No one deserves to be left alone. Not anymore.**_


	14. Chapter 14:Chaws, Rybs, and Battle Claws

Chapter 14: Chaws, Rybs and Battle Claws (Oh My)

After the enlightening eye-opener that was given to me by Daniel, I had said my goodbyes, and I quickly returned to the land of the living. It appeared that Mirah had not come back from her mission to aid the burned owlet, so I relegated most of my attention to the piece of paper beside me. I began to draw away, creating tiny pieces of childlike art. I wasn't the greatest artist, not in the slightest, but I had fun. In the first of the ten panels I created, I drew myself atop a cliff, kicking Soren's brother off of it with the strength that even Leonidas would be proud of, while Soren comedically proclaims to the Heavens, "What have you done!?" (Am I a terrible person for imagining that?).

In the second, I made an equally amusing scenario where we were all currently engaged in a race across the Nevada Desert, and the first person to get to California gets a million dollars (I think it's a stolen plot from a movie, I don't care). Twilight and Digger were too busy bickering with one another to realize that everyone else had already started the race, and Daniel was preoccupied with trying to woo Gylfie's heart, while the elf owl coyly giggles at his shenanigans. Out of the four of us that were still in the race, I was lagging behind Cato, who was tailing Soren pretty close. Matthias was nowhere to be seen. Once we had made it to civilization, we decided to forget the race and chill inside a local casino at Las Vegas. Once we got inside, we had actually found that the screech owl had already given up on the race, and was playing a slot machine. We had caught him in the midst of the machine that was spitting out tens of thousands of coins. The coins kept piling up and up, until they reached the ceiling of the establishment. Then, he says "Um, did I do something wrong, guys? I think I broke it." The painfully bad quality comic ended with that dumb quote.

I wanted to make one more "comic", but I heard the sound of someone's footsteps coming up to me. I tried to hide the paper behind me, yet I was too late, as someone snatched the paper from my talons. I looked up, and I saw the shit-eating grin on the screech owl's face.

"Alex, I never knew you were an artist." He said, and I shook my head at him, waving my good wing in front of his face, telling him to stop his observation. "Oh, come on, Alex, this isn't particularly bad or anything. It's pretty decent, especially for someone who probably has never seen a piece of paper in his life before. Although, I don't know this language you're using. Definitely not Hoolian, that's for sure."

While I wanted to disagree with that statement, I begrudgingly accepted the compliment. I knew that Matt wasn't a good liar, (he always has that awkward straining face whenever he did, and I always called him out for it), and refusing the compliment would land me directly in the danger zone.

"Who's this?" He pointed to the first panel, with the image of me Sparta kicking the deadbeat brother off the cliff.

" _Kludd."_ I silently mouthed the asshole's name, and he smirked at the amusing sight.

"Alex, you are a troubled individual." I roll my eyes at the understatement of the year. "You're lucky I don't believe that he can save him. Otherwise, I'd be a little, uh… pissed off, is that how you would say it? I'd really like to, don't get me wrong, but a real older brother would have stayed with his sibling no matter what. That's what Nylan would have done, it's what I would have done."

 _You know someone is deeply below the shit on your heel when a guy like Matthias says that there's no hope for them._

"Anyways, enough of that depressing stuff. I wanted to talk to you about what's going to happen once you get out of this cramped infirmary. You know we're all training to become Guardians, right?" I shook my head, I mean they're really doing that? Was finding them just not good enough?

"Yeah, judging from your reaction, you had no clue. The truth is, I wanted to do this because of you. You made me realize that apathy will only breed more apathy. I don't want anyone else to live in a world where the youth are kidnapped because scum like the Pure Ones think that we're just fodder for their armies, slaves to be controlled. I want this world to be peaceful, and if that means that I have to become a Guardian, I'll do it."

So, he did this because of me? If you told me a couple months ago that I was going to be a positive influence in someone's life, I'd have never believed you.

"Alex, this was a _big_ decision in my life that I made. Know that I'm not forcing you to do anything that you don't want to do. If you don't want to-" I shushed him with a wing, already knowing what my answer was. This might have been hard for him, but it wasn't for me.

 _I'm going to be a Guardian, even if it kills me._

"Does that mean that…?" I nodded, and then he suddenly jumps up and tackles me to the ground. The air in my lungs was temporarily pushed out of my body, I clearly wasn't expecting the little puffball of joy to "assault" me. "You really mean it?!" I gave him my signature sarcastic face.

"This is amazing! You're the best, Alex! So, how about tomorrow night, before I go to practice, I'll tell you all about how this place works, and I'll even get you started on writing Hoolian, how's that sound?" Matthias was rapidly running out of oxygen to speak, so I nodded immediately.

" _Why not_?" I soundlessly said.

"Cool!" He cheered, and hugged me once again. I didn't want him to skip out on sleeping, but given my current situation, I couldn't really tell him that he should get some rest. Matthias looked around the room, and visibly moaned in displeasure. "Oh, uh, fiddlesticks!? I'm sorry, Alex, I think I have to go now. I'm not really allowed to be in here right now, so… see ya?" I waved goodbye to the screech owl, who reciprocated the action.

I sigh and rub my eyes with my good wing. His boundless amount of energy sometimes gets the better of me. Now that I no longer had to worry about him, seeing as how he must have went to bed, because a small portion of the sun's thin beams of light had penetrated through the cracks of the tree, illuminating the infirmary. Now I could continue with my third panel of my dumb comic. I grasped the pencil in my talons, and I started to draw about another adventure our gang would have in the land of the free. I didn't stop until my limb got sore, and I began to follow the calls of the sleep siren, eventually pulling me into the dreamscape.

—

As the nights went by, I was getting stronger and stronger. Night number four, I was able to leave the infirmary by myself, although I could not hope to reach the lower or upper levels without the direct assistance of others. Since I didn't want to be a burden for anyone, I insisted that I would venture out into the world when I was well and ready. The last thing I'd want people to do was to treat me like an invalid.

It was going to be a challenge, but hard work makes the dream work and all that. Besides, it wasn't like I was alone in this. I had all of my friends with me, and I was even starting to make new ones here at the tree.

Matthias and I were currently walking our way down to the library (Take that, Mirah, I was going to make it in six, not seven), and he was gauging how much I knew about all of the different classes and teachers that the Guardians had.

"So, if you were tapped for Coilering, what other chaw would you have to be tapped for?" He questioned, and while it took some time for the answer to pop into my brain, I did manage to quietly say the right answer.

"Weather Interpretation, right?"

"Correct, and who're the rybs for those two chaws?" Ryb was just another, more respectful word for a teacher, and chaw was the owl word for class. It's weird, but in this world, everything was. I was just more or less used to it by now.

"Doesn't Ezylryb teach Weather Interpretation?" He nodded. "Is it… Elvisryb that teaches Coilering?"

"It's _Elvanryb_ , not Elvisryb. That sounds kind of stupid, don't you think?"

"It is not! Elvis is a way cooler name than Elvan." Elvan was the one that sounded dumb and reminded me of an elf on Lord of the Rings.

"Okay, before we get into _yet another_ argument on what one name is better than the other, we're moving on. What's the thing they leave in your hollow if you're tapped for Ga'hoology?"

 _Shit, I forgot! Uh, was it the coal, or was it the feather? Crap, just blurt out the first thing that makes logical sense._

"Is it a dried caterpillar?" I asked, unsuringly. Unfortunately, my answer was wrong.

"Nope, that's Weather Interpretation. It's not surprising that you didn't remember something like that, to be honest. Most owls seem to agree that Ga'hoology would be the last thing they'd want to be tapped for."

"Well, do you want to dig up dirt and worms with your bare talons for the rest of your life?" I sarcastically replied, and he shook his head.

"I understand that it's an important job, keeping the tree healthy and alive. But I don't think I could do that. I'd rather be helping people, than a plant. It's a very humongous, and grand plant, in the most basic of terms, but still, it's a plant."

"Isn't the ryb also a bit on the loony side? Like, she's not nearly on the same level as Digger, yet I think I heard some owls complain that she wasn't, you know, a hundred percent with them. Do all burrowing owls end up going insane at some point in their life?"

"That's just rumors, Alex. Don't believe everything that someone that you don't know tells you."

"Alright, so what else do you got for me?" I asked, as we finally arrived at the library. It was a large sized hollow, and as expected, it was almost chocked to the brim with an assortment of scrolls and books.

"Do you want to practice writing everyone's names again?"

"Do I have to?" I groaned at the thought of writing in the foreign gobbledygook language known as Hoolian.

"Yes, Alex. It's pretty much a requirement if you want to be a Guardian. No legend ever told of the silver owl who was illiterate, and doodled on paper instead of learning Hoolian on it."

"Fine." I muttered, and he brought out another piece of dirty brown parchment from a pile on Ezylryb's personal desk. "Is he going to be okay with us using his little collection?"

"Um… maybe? What's the worst thing he can do to us, poke us to death with his toe stub? Squint really hard into our skulls?"

"I don't know, man. Does it snow in the Northern Kingdoms?" I jested. I had recently learned that the kingdoms up north were notorious for always being cold and frozen at pretty much all times of the year.

"Ha, ha. Very funny, but seriously, I don't think the old man would mind. If he personally vouched for believing in our story, he's probably not a bad guy. He's just…"

"Weird?" I finished for him, and Matt slowly nodded in response.

"Yeah. Anyways, let's just get started before I have to go, okay?" He turned the subject around, and I grabbed another owlish pencil from his desk, and walked to a nearby table. I started off with what I knew the best, which was my own name. When I was done, Matthias silently stares at my handiwork.

 _Is it good? It's probably shit, isn't it?_

"Eh… that's not as bad as when you first started, but… can you do it again? Your x is a little bit too funky, and the e's, well that's really screwed up. No offense." I groaned in irritation, before retrying. My second attempt at writing my own name was thankfully better than the other. It might have helped that I didn't rush through it.

"Is this good?" I asked, and Matt gave me a wing's up.

"Uh-Huh. Now, let's move on to Cato's." He said, and this time, I made sure that I wasn't taking any shortcuts like how I do when I write in English.

"That reminds me," I let go of the pencil for a second, and I looked at Matt. "Has Cato been tapped yet? I know he's not quite as on board with this whole thing, but…"

"No, he hasn't. But you have to remember, I was tapped early for the Healing Chaw because... I wasn't really good at anything else." He gazed down low to the ground. "Is that bad?"

"Not at all. But, aren't you at least a little good at blacksmithing?" I inquired the screech owl, who reluctantly shook his head.

"Not really. I basically had Bubo hold the hammer for me while I kind of took up the role of a supervisor. And, while I wanted to be with Barran in the Search and Rescue Chaw, I don't have the strength for it." He peers back up at me and smirks. "I think you'd be incredible for that Chaw, don't you think?"

"Matt, I have to rescue _myself_ first, before I can rescue other people. If I keep getting messed up in every fight, I'd just be a liability."

"That's a load of racdrops, Alex!" He suddenly snaps at me. "You saved me, you saved Soren and Gylfie."

" _Grimble did,_ Matt. Look where that got him."

"I know, Alex! You kept telling me that he could still be alive, but he's probably… dead. But you're not! You're still with us, and…" He looks around the room. "Listen, I talked to Daniel about this. He told me that if it wasn't for you and him, I'd probably still be picking flecks for the Pure Ones."

"Daniel was the one who watched over you guys, not me. Matt. The legends saved you from losing everything you had. If I can't save myself from this," I unwrapped part of my bandage on my leg, the injury still relatively fresh and red, with a small row of stitches that kept the skin in place. "How am I ever going to save other people? How am I going to save you guys?"

"Alex, just stop. It doesn't matter if you get hurt or not. What matters is that your gizzard, your heart and head are all in the right place. I'm sure that they'll teach you how to fight properly, just…" He comes up to me with teary eyes. "Stop thinking that you're no good at anything. There's too much talent in that brain of yours to be wasted on stupid shit like that."

I kindly smiled at the screech owl. "You said shit."

"I know I did, Alex. I guess I know who to thank for that, don't I?" He wipes the tears in his eyes, and grins.

"Does the T go like this?" I picked up the pencil and started to write out the crow's name. "Or like this?" I show him my penmanship, and he rolls his eyes in disapproval.

"Glaumora above, no! That's not at all what it's suppose to look like!"

"Well, since you're the frinking expert, why don't you show me?"

"I will! Here, look at my name." He yanks the pencil out of my talons, and puts down his name on the paper. "Now, just try to copy that."

"Okay." He gave me the pencil back, and being the eternal wisecracker I was, I knowingly screwed up most of the letters in his name, and his face was the absolute best.

"Alex, come on! This is worst than when I practiced writing my name with my family! And I was just six nights old!"

"Whoops, sorry bout that." I lightheartedly apologized. Somehow, the second time around, I had managed to screw up his name even more.

"Dude! Are you having a laugh!?" He frustratingly exclaimed, and I chuckled in amusement at his decreasing amount of patience.

"I don't know, are you?" I sweetly asked the screech owl. I could have sworn I saw a vein that was ready to burst in his head.

"That makes no sense at all!" He growls, and I couldn't stop the eminent churring from happening. This was just too good to be real. "Are you trying to be the next Digger?"

"If I was, I'd be living in the clouds, Matt, while I spouted off about how 'these generations of Strigiformes don't appreciate my vaunted wisdom!'"

"You are one _huge_ jerkbird."

"And you are half the size of me, tiny man." I smirked, bracing myself for the tirade to come.

 _I missed messing with him so much._


	15. Chapter 15: Better Days, Better Nights

**Ooh, look, another chapter, and so soon (In comparison to my usual** **procrastinating** **self)!? Yes, and there's two more after this. Maybe more will come out in the next week or two, or sooner, not quite too sure just yet.**

Chapter 15: Better Days, Better Nights

If the Pure Ones were capable of committing these atrocities, than what does that say for our enemies, these Guardians of Ga'hoole? What could be worse than taking away children from everything they've ever known, and everything that they were? Very soon, I was going to find out.

"No, Frazier, never. These legends, this book, where'd you get them?" I questioned the eagle owl.

"Let me ask you this, Anna. What did everyone say about that Boreal owl, the one who taught those owlets to fly far away from here? To seek a better life, in the wings of our enemies?"

"That he was traitorous scum. That everyone was glad that he was dead. That he sent this place into chaos because those owlets were going to inform the Guardians of our whereabouts. But, it's not true, is it?"

"No… no. Grimble was a dear friend of mine. What he did was one of the bravest things that a person could do in here. He knew the chances of coming out of here alive were slim to none, but he carried on. He gave me this, a few nights before they finally escaped."

"Why would he do that?"

"He wanted a way out of Hagsmire, to redeem himself of every single act of cruelty that he committed under the eyes of the Pure Ones. Those owlets were his last hope. I think he knew that he wasn't going to make it, so he granted this book to me. To break the vicious cycle of suffering and pain once again. And this time around, I intend to keep living, no matter what. These legends will help us when the time comes to leave Aggies."

 _So, that's why Grimble did what he did. He didn't condemn us all to death. He saved those owlets._ _Did he want to save me too?_

 _Has he already done that?_

"Frazier, you really want us to leave Aggies? I know that they've done awful, terrible things, but it's the only place I can call home. Where would we even go?"

"Home is not just a place, Anna. It's also right here." He pointed at my chest. "It's where the heart is. I want you and your friends to get out of here, and I want you all to do it tonight, before things get any worse."

"Where would we go?" I repeated my question, and he slightly grins.

"The Guardians of Ga'hoole, of course. Didn't you say that you liked aiding the wounded? I'm sure they wouldn't mind another healer."

"I don't know, Frazier, I mean, this feels wrong. I spent all of my life in here, and you want me to give it up?" Suddenly, the eagle owl put his wings around my shoulders, looking very serious.

"This isn't a life worth living, Anna! I do _not_ want to see you get skewered by a Guardian because you stubbornly refused to leave. Do you really want to die for them? Is that what you want?"

 _What am I saying? I don't really mean any of that. If Frazier wants me to leave, I'd be a fool to argue with him._

"I don't. I really, don't want to." My eyes start to water, as I embrace the man. "I'm sorry, I know I should be tough, capable, and strong and I just keep being an idiot every step of the way. I'm sorry…"

"You are strong Anna. You are the strongest person I've ever met in my life. Don't let anybody else tell you differently. Now, come on. " He lifted my head up from his chest, and smiled that same smile that I saw the first night I ever laid my eyes on him. "Wipe those tears from your eyes, we've got a long journey ahead of us."

He retrieves a satchel from his nest, and puts the book inside it, alongside a few other things that he needed. He slings it over his shoulder and we exit his room and into the infirmary. The maimed owlet was still sleeping soundlessly on the bed.

"Frazier, what are we going to do with him?" I inquired.

"We're taking him with us. Go ahead and carry him. He's not that heavy, unlike yourself." He smirked at the jab about my supposed weight.

"I am not fat!" I frustratingly said, and he churred at my declaration. I did as he requested, and I grabbed the small owlet in my talons. We quickly ran out of the infirmary, and then I heard the sound of a familiar voice quietly call out from above us.

"Hey, where you guys going?" Whispered the white faced owl, who stealthily hopped down from her perch above the infirmary. She seemed to have scared the eagle owl, who jumped in shock. He quickly gathered his bearings, and I told her what we were doing.

"We're leaving, Liz."

"What do you mean, leaving?" She asked, and while I wanted to answer her, I decided that I'd just be a bit of a bitch about it. There's no telling what the Pure Ones would do if they found out we were going rogue.

"There's no time to explain! Just follow us, Liz!" I harshly said to her, and thankfully, she made no more questions. Just a simple nod, and we were off. Frazier led us to a remote location that was rather secluded inside the depths of Aggies. We swiftly ducked and weaved past the dozens of guards that were patrolling, discretion was the weapon of choice that was going to get us out of here in one piece. Now that there were _real_ consequences, my heart was nearly beating straight out of my chest, the rapid thumping seemed to be right in my ears.

We slinked into the seething darkness, waiting for the right opportunities to move closer and closer to our goal. After we hid behind another large rock formation, Frazier silently signaled for us to keep going. We were going to make it out of here, my gizzard was usually quiet, but for now, it made itself clear. Stalking over to another formation, we headed inside a place that I've never seen before. I was going to learn, that this place was where those owlets had begun their own journey.

 _We were going to follow in their footsteps._

"Where's Leon?" Frazier breathlessly muttered, and Liz shrugged her shoulders.

"He said he was going to hang around for awhile, maybe he went back home."

"You'd better hope that he's there. He's not going to be safe for long in Ambala, once they find out that we left, they'll be crawling up our tailfeathers until we get to the Beaks."

Suddenly, a chilling, and somehow still annoying voice rang in our ears. I slowly turned around, and I saw the faces of two horned owls, looking at us deviously. Like literal hagsfiends.

"Now, what do we have here? Jutt, what does it look like to you?" Jatt eyes at him for an answer.

"Three turn feathers, that's what!" Jutt crazily proclaims to his brother with an unsettling grin growing on his face.

"And, What do we do with turn feathers?"

"We… end them." The horned owls both darkly chuckle, and their manic eyes seem to pierce my inner being. Frazier stoically opposes the two, with a terrifying look in his eyes that I had never seen before.

"I'll kill you both before you lay a talon on them." The eagle owl lowly growls.

The three remained in a wordless standoff, until Jatt decided to make the first move. He quickly charges at the eagle owl, and Frazier adopts a defensive stance, waiting for the horned owl to get closer. While the two were preoccupied, Jutt stares at Liz and I with intent to kill.

"So, I get stuck with the two dumb bitches. Go figures." He disappointingly sighs, and I gingerly let go of the owlet. I join up with my friend, as she gazed at the other horned owl with a viciousness of her own.

"I wonder… how does Bubo taste?" She morbidly asks out loud, and for a split second, the horned owl was caught off guard. He wasn't expecting that from her, yet I was. "But then again, even a vulture wouldn't go near your corpse, would it?" I quickly moved behind the twisted owl, effectively splitting his attention in half. I decide to join in on the mockery to draw out his attention from my friend while she gets closer to him.

"Hey, is it Jatt, or Jutt? It's hard to tell when you guys have the same personality and everything, you know? One of those faces you make, what's it called, 'the predator', looks like you were caught in the middle of sprinking your own mother. But, maybe you did do that, it might explain how mentally deficient you two are." Unfortunately, my goading seemed to have finally got to him, as he screeches in anger, and begins to sprint towards me.

"You'll regret saying that, you mangy bitch!" He says in a boiling rage, and I prepared to brace myself for the upcoming fight. He leaps up into the air and extends his talons out, diving straight to me. Right before he could land a hit on me, I dodged the attack, rolling on the ground. I went closer to Liz, who lowers her head down in an attack pose, wings spread out as she lets out a quiet, but still quite threatening hiss, like she was a snake in her former life. She jumps up into the air, and I follow her move. The horned owl goes back into the air with us, and gets ever so nearer to my friend with a blood lust in his eyes.

She and the crazed owl exchange blow after blow, scoring hits on each other. Drops of crimson blood spatter on the rocky ground, the moon in the sky shining on the bright red liquid. They lock talons, and as they struggle to remain in the air, I had made my way higher and higher, and then, in a split second, I dive bombed straight into the two. Luckily, I had managed to hit my intended target, my talons slashing into the flesh of the wicked avian. As more of his blood splatters on the stones, we fumble down to the ground. I shakily stood back up, and as I tried to get Liz back on her feet, I saw something I never wanted to see.

The other horned owl had cornered the eagle owl, with his talons clenched tightly around Frazier's throat. I quickly began to run to him, but something solid harshly stops me, slamming me down to the ground. Jutt has his own talons constricting my legs, pinning me to the floor with his body.

"This is wonderful! You can watch as your friends die around you, and I can break every, single, bone in your body!" The owl crudely whispered in my ears, as I could only watch in pure terror. He painfully twists my injured leg, causing me to shriek in agony.

 _Stop it! For Glaux's sake, Stop it!_

The pain keeps getting worse, as he contorts my leg to his sick pleasure. Frazier was almost on the verge of passing out for good, and so was I. It was terrible. So terrible... So...

"Get your filthy talons off of her, fiend!" A voice shouts out, and an unknown force tackles my aggressor to the ground, and as I gazed up, I saw a familiar face that was shrouded in an iron helmet.

"Leon?" I quietly muttered. Even through the cold mask, he gave me a warm smile.

"You know it. I'll never abandon you guys, you can count on that." He says, before brandishing a pair of battle claws at the horned owl. "Now, as for you two, you must have a death wish. And fortunately for you, I'll oblige!"

Both Jatt and Jutt had simultaneously began to charge once again. They ran to the barred owl, who had acrobatically managed to avoid every single swipe and strike they were trying to land on him. Leon leaps into the air, and jumps over the two, slashing one of Jutt's tufts of feathers clean off. Blood spurts profusely from his wound, yet they still pressed on the attack. As the fight continued, Frazier waded over to me, and reached his wing out

"Lass, can you get up?" He rasped, and I tried to get up but the pain was too great. "Aw, racdrops! Here, I'll carry you, and then when we get up to the cliff, I want you to just jump, you got it?!" I nodded. As we pushed our muscles to their limit, I heard the nearly silent flapping of more wings that were quickly approaching our location. Soon, there were more and more Pure Ones that were surrounding us, the bright red in their eyes, perfectly encapsulating everything that my "family" truly was, it was something I will never forget. I tried to look back, to see if my friends were with us, but Frazier gave me a command that I could not refuse.

"Take this, Anna!" He hastily puts his brown satchel around my shoulder, as we stand near the edge of the rocky cliff. Freedom was a fleeting thing, yet I was going to catch it. "Fly far, fly fast, and never look back. You got me?!" Before I could even say my goodbyes, Frazier quickly pushes me off, and... I did what he asked me to do. I didn't stop for anything, I kept going. Dozens of voices shouted and screamed in my ears, the raging heart inside me pounding in my ears as I flew off, the moon ominously shining radiantly above me.

I knew what I had to do. There were doubts in my mind, but now, everything was starting to become clear.

 _I'm going to find the Guardians, for the safety of all I know, I'm going to find them._


	16. Chapter 16: Alone Again

Chapter 16: Alone Again

My mind went of its own accord for… who knows how long. Instincts were the one thing that guided me out of the desolate canyons, and would lead me to the outskirts of Ambala. There was no time for questions, no time for hesitation. Adrenaline had fueled my body for the escape, yet now I was beginning to feel the effects of my ravaged leg. The pain would soon become a serious problem, and if I let the wound fester, I feared that I would not have a leg anymore.

As the ground below me started to turn into the familiar green of grass and dotted with dozens of trees and, well, life, I continued forward. I did not want to risk being captured by _them_ , that would never bode well with my livelihood. Even when my wings grew tired and sore, and my leg practically screeched in agony, I did not stop. I can make it through this, I kept telling myself. While the moon was still out, I couldn't afford to dawdle.

It was only a matter of time before the sun would eventually come out from its hiding place, and I would be threatened with the possibility of a mob of crows, _and_ a squadron of enraged, listless Pure Ones. After what felt like four hours of non stop flight, I finally decided to settle down inside what I hoped to be an abandoned or vacant hollow in a tree. I tiredly swooped down, perching on a branch. In that moment, I was vividly reminded of my injury.

"Oh, Glaux-damn it!" I quietly cursed to myself, before using my other leg as support. I painfully flexed my bad leg into a resting position, nestled within my dirtied feathers. I carefully sidled my way over to the opening to the hollow, and once I made it inside, I immediately collapsed from exhaustion. It was getting harder to remain conscious, but if I wanted to keep both of my limbs, I had to at least reset the bones, and close the wound.

I crawled over to a corner in the hollow, and I propped myself into a slightly more comfortable position. I leaned on the wooden wall of the tree, and I opened the satchel.

 _Time to take inventory, I guess._

I rummaged through the contents of the bag, I first pulled out the book, and then I got out the other bundle of white cloth. I gasped in shock, and I silently thanked the eagle owl for not forgetting such an important item. I dumped out the rest of the things inside, which were a thick rolled up piece of paper, a strange metal object with two arrows (one that was red and the other which was grey), and a small white box. When I reached over to grab the bandage, I noticed that something was _very_ wrong with my leg.

 _Bone's not supposed to stick out like that, Anna._

Ugh, that slimy rotten wet-pooper! He had forcefully twisted my bones in such a way, that my tibia had dislocated from its original location, and it had peeked its way out through my skin. It was a sickening sight to see, and even more chilling and disgusting to think about how that was _my_ bone, my body that was severely sprinked up. I hesitantly touched the area, and I instantly felt a sharp pain resonating in my entire leg.

I've never wished someone's demise before, but now, I was praying to Glaux himself that he might find it within himself to smite those two for me. It was wishful thinking, but what else could I have done? Other than do what Frazier taught me. We've had a few broken bones from some of our patients, but I don't think that any of them were open fractures. Still, at least I knew the basics. I mean, It shouldn't be too hard, right?

 _Think of it like a puzzle piece, it'll click inside your head, and you can be done with it. Quick and painless, that's the way to do it._

I stretched my bad leg to the fullest of its ability, and I clutched right below the exposed bone. It was now or never. In one instance, I pulled with all of my remaining strength in the opposite direction of the bone, and I screamed in pain. My vision was getting blurry from the excruciating agony, but I still saw that the bone wasn't fully inside my leg. I waited for a moment to regain my clarity, and then I began to forcefully tug my leg again.

"Mother of Mercy!" I cried out, and the pain returned to me double fold. I peered over, and I was supremely frinked off.

" _That bone's as stubborn as you, Anna."_ I heard Frazier's snickering voice in my mind, and that was when I couldn't take it anymore. In a final remaining burst of strength, I pushed my leg as far as I could, and I screamed. This was one of the worst things I've ever experienced in my life, and that was saying something. It took awhile for me to get past the suffering I had to undergo, but with a combination of slow breathes in and out, and a distant comforting memory, they became my two painkillers that I had to rely on.

When I was comfortable enough to continue with my self treatment, I cautiously peered at my handiwork. The wound was still open, but thankfully, I had successfully reattached my bone back to where it belonged. I sighed in relief, grabbing the roll of fresh cloth and wrapping it around my injured leg. If I had stitches, I would use them, but seeing as how Frazier was somehow a forgetful kleptomaniac, I had to make due with what he had inside the bag.

Now that the chances of a sudden amputation were lowered, I could for once, get the rest that I desperately needed. I wearily closed my eyes, and drifted off into the depths of my mind.

" _But, Mr. Frazier, I don't think I know how to do that." A childlike voice had sadly muttered. The voice belonged to an owlet, who was feeling like a fool for messing up something that seemed so simple at first._

" _Anna, it's not hard at all." The eagle owl kindly said. "Here, just watch me." He proceeded to professionally thread a small needle, and made sure that the child wasn't night dreaming."Now, make sure that you remain calm and collected as you make your way through the loop, okay? Keep your talons firm and centered, and your eyes on the prize."_

 _The eagle owl repeated the motions for a few times, and the owlet tried to do the same. She was just about to give up on the fourth attempt, but fortunately for her, she had finally managed to do what the avian had been doing without too much of an effort. She cried out in joy, as she raised her wings to proclaim her victory to the skies above._

" _I did it! Mr. Frazier, did you see that!?" She energetically asked him, who churred at her carefree disposition. Beneath his laughter was a growing feeling of pride arising from his gizzard._

" _Good job, Anna." He congratulated the snowy owlet. "That wasn't difficult at all, now was it?"_

" _Nuh-uh." She replied with a sweet smirk on her face."Can I do it again?"_

" _Why not? Practice makes perfect, and this is no different." The eagle owl said, and she immediately began to unthread the needle, and while it took some time for her to re thread it, it wasn't quite as difficult as she thought it would be. She wanted to keep doing it, but Frazier sneakily strided up to the owlet, and snatched the needle and thread right from her talons. "Alright, lass, I think it's time for you to go to bed."_

" _But I don't wanna." She whined. "Five more minutes?" She asked the eagle owl with pleading eyes. Unfortunately for her, the avian wouldn't budge._

" _Anna," He started, crossing his wings. "The sun's almost out. You need the rest, sweetie."_

" _Can you at least read me a bedtime story?" She requested, looking at him with a pouty expression on her face. He stares at the owlet, trying to resist the effects of her inherent cuteness, but even the best of us could not ignore the wishes of a child like her. He sighs, and tell her that he would._

" _Just wait here." Frazier says, before leaving the infirmary lobby to presumably retrieve something from his own bedroom. He soon returns with a small book in his talons. He gestures for the owlet to follow him, and they settle down on one of the nests scattered around the room. He puts down the book, and she was utterly confused at the words on the cover. Whatever it was, she couldn't understand anything._

" _Mr. Frazier, what's this one called?" She questioned._

" _It's…" He tried to make the reveal a little more dramatic. "The Ugly Duckling."_

" _The Ugly Duckling?" She repeated. "That doesn't sound good at all. What even is a duckling? Why is it ugly? And why-"_

" _Lass, I'll tell you, but you have to keep quiet, alright? This is story-time, just pretend that you're listening to one of those lectures. You can ask me questions after." She grumbled for a moment, for allowing the eagle owl to tell the strange sounding story. Frazier puts on his best narrator voice, as he recounts the tale of the ugly duckling._

 _There once was a lively little farm, surrounded by dozens of Others and even more animals. And past the little farm, was a little pond. And on the bank of this pond, was a single mother, laying upon her nest, guarding something that was very precious to her. She was sitting on a clutch of eggs, dutifully watching over each and every one of them until… finally, they all began to hatch. The mother gasps in both shock and delight, and intently watches the birth of her children. One by one, duckling after duckling climbed their way out of their shelled prisons... all except for one._

 _She waits in anticipation for the rest of her children to come to her, yet as she waited and waited, nothing happened. She soon realized the truth, and blinked back some tears. She regrettably leaves her nest with her children following right behind her._

" _What?! How could something like that happen?" Anna interrupted, not expecting the death of something so young like herself._

" _Just wait, lass, you'll see." Frazier Calmly told the intrigued owlet, before continuing the story._

 _However, what the mother assumed was not the truth. There was still a life inside the lone egg, and it was finally starting to break through. It broke free, and immediately started wondering where everything was. Where was its parents? Did it even have them? And, well, just what are these parents? Are they good for him, or bad?_

 _The duckling was forced to make due with what it had. The nest its mother left provided the comfort it needed to survive for a time, and it quickly began to learn about what food it could eat, and how to drink water from its bill. It was a very smart duckling, although… it would soon find out that other animals would not care about that._

" _What happened?" Anna sadly asks, and the eagle owl waggles his talon in front of her face_.

" _Ah,ah,ah, just listen."_

 _The duckling, after it felt confident enough to wander through the grass and water, began to search for any signs of life. It wanted to find its parents, wanted to find friends, maybe even a new home. It waddled to a single oak tree, and it looked up to see a pretty red feathered bird with a bright orange beak._

" _Excuse me, sir." The duckling tried to grab the attention of the strange looking bird. "Do you know where my parents are?" The bird merely continued to preppily preen itself, ignoring the duckling like he wasn't even there. "Excuse me!" The duckling raised his voice, and the bird jumped up from fright, and looked down to the ground. It locked eyes with the duckling, seemingly angered by the duckling's interruption._

" _What do you_ __ _want, **freak**?" The creature callously derided, and the duckling was not angered or intimidated by this, but confused yet again._

" _What's that mean?" The duckling sweetly asked, and the bird grumbled something inaudible._

" _What do you think, genius? Now, just go away, before anybody else sees me talking to someone like you." The red bird rudely shooed away the duckling, who reluctantly waddled away from the tree._

 _The duckling did not understand what the bird meant. He wasn't a freak, he was just another regular duckling, nothing more, nothing less. As he waddled closer to the river where his nest was, he saw… birds in the water! Ducks, the same as him, they could set this story straight! He quickly jumped into the water, and swam closer to the small flock._

 _The duckling waded to one of the ducks, and for some odd reason, the duck swiftly avoided his attempts to communicate with one of his own kind. The duckling swam over to another duck, yet the same exact thing happened. Nobody seemed to be in a talking mood, all except for one duck, that was bigger than everyone else in the pond. This was probably the leader of this pack. Or, would it be called a flock instead? Hopefully, they'd explain everything to him._

" _Are you trying to scare everyone off?" The duck interrogated the small duckling, who quickly shook his head._

" _No, sir, I was just trying to talk with one of my kind. That bird up in the tree said I was a freak… am I a freak?" The larger duck darkly chuckled to himself._

" _Why don't you look in the water? Tell me what you see." The duck suggested, and the duckling curiously peered down._

 _The duckling saw itself in the reflection of the pond's surface. He noticed that his feathers were darker than everyone else's in the pond, and his bill was as black as the night sky. Its coal eyes widened in horror, as the rest of the ducks began to verbally assault the duckling for its appearance._

" _He just now realized that he was ugly?"_

" _So, he's stupid,_ _ **and**_ _ugly?"_

" _I hope I never have a kid as horrid as him."_

 _More and more antagonizing voices could be heard in his head, and he suddenly screamed in disbelief, as he hastily rushes out of the water and waddles into a dark and dreary cave. He looks down to the ground, and he began to cry. They weren't lying, he was a freak. He cried and cried, until no more tears could have been shed, and he fell into a dreamless sleep._

 _Maybe, this was all a dream. Or, in this case, just a nightmare._

"Alright, _I think we're done for tonight." The eagle owl says, closing the book._

" _Oh, come on! Don't leave me hanging! Mr. Frazier, I hate it when you leave things on a cliffhanger!" Anna exclaimed, and the eagle owl churred in amusement._

" _Sorry, lass, but we'll just have to finish the story another time. I think I can see the sun from here."_

" _Fine… good light, Mr. Frazier." Anna tiredly said, as she yawned and stretched her limbs. She soon fell asleep, and the eagle owl smiled at her._

" _Good light, Anna."_

I didn't know how much time had past since I arrived at this hollow and passed out from exhaustion, but that didn't matter. As I slowly sat up, I felt the distinct feeling of bark scratching up my back. I stretched my limbs, and while I was a bit worried because of the cracking in my bones, I realized that it was just the sound of my joints.

I slowly stood up, and the pain in my leg wasn't getting that better. It was without a doubt, better than before I fell asleep, but it still wasn't a good feeling. I tiredly opened the rolled up piece of paper, and I noticed that it was a map of the Southern Kingdoms. Granted, it wasn't exactly the best of drawings, yet it would be serviceable for the time being. I tried to track down my location on the map, and I roughly guessed that I was in some part of Western Ambala.

I picked up the metal object with two large arrows, and I noticed that it had strange markings. There were smaller, engraved arrows inside this device, and at the end of the arrows were a series of letters.

 _I felt like wing slapping myself for being so daft._

This is a compass, and not just any compass, but a compass made by Others. The letters were written in English, one of the languages created by the mysterious species. Once again, I thanked the eagle owl for teaching me the fundamentals of the language. With this, I could easily figure out which direction to go in, I gathered my things, and put them all in the brown satchel. I was just about to take off from the hollow when I heard a gruff voice.

"Do you think anybody's in there?" It asked to either itself or another person.

"Well, we're not going to find out if we just sit around here, just wait for me, I'll scout ahead." Another voice answered the first one.

 _This has gone to hagsmire in a handbasket. Glaux-damn it!_


	17. Chapter 17: We're All Strangers

Chapter 17: We're all Strangers

A million different things were running through my mind. Most, if not all of them, were very negative. Had the Pure Ones caught up to me? Was there a group of crows that planned to rob me of everything I had? Are they going to kill me?!

I held my breath, as I slowly limped over to the entrance of the hollow. I laid my head on the edge, and I listened for any sounds of movement or if the voices were still speaking. Apart from the wind, and the chirping of day birds, the world was quiet. Too quiet for my taste.

"Um… hello?" Someone quietly greeted me, and I nearly jumped in fright, quickly crawling away from the mysterious assassin that no doubt was planning my demise. I backed up far away from the individual, until my back was against the wood. I spread my wings out, and made myself look twice as big, in the hopes that I might scare off this owl.

"Go away!" I ordered to the intruder, who was a barking owl. Its pale green eyes, strangely did not hold any malicious intent in them, but I kept my guard up regardless. I didn't want to risk dying because of a foolish mistake.

"What's going on in there, TJ?" The gruff voice I had heard before questioned from outside, and my eyes widen, as I suddenly fall down to the ground. A burning sensation arose from my bad leg, and I felt cold, terribly so. Something warm ran down my leg, leaking out of my bandage. I couldn't get back up again if my life depended on it. I had officially left my fate in the wings of the two strangers.

 _The moment of truth. Would they kill me for treason, kill me for trespassing, or, however unlikely it may seem, simply leave me alone?_

"Uh, Nico, you might want to come over here." The barking owl says to the other person. I barely heard the flapping of large wings outside the hollow, as I shivered uncontrollably, curling myself up in a ball to keep what little warmth I still possessed.

"Teej, who the hag is this?" The owl quite literally towered over me and the barking owl, with an equally strong and booming voice to go with.

"I don't know, she was busy telling me to leave and now she's shaking like a leaf." TJ shrugged, and the big owl came over to me and pressed his wing on my forehead.

"Wow, she's running a mighty fever. Listen, girl, we just need to know one thing before we can help you. Are you alone?"

"A… alone?" I asked, the bitter cold was making my speech impeded, my consciousnesses slowly moving farther and farther away from my being.

"Yes, is there anybody else that could be looking for you? Anybody that'd try to hurt us if they found out we were with you?"

"Yeah… is that a… problem?"

"Dude, we can deal with that later. Let's just," The barking owl interjected, before looking at me with a shocked expression. "She's bleeding pretty bad, Nico. Do we have some leeches back home?"

"We do. Come on, we gotta hurry. That storm that we saw coming in here, we can probably beat it before it gets any worse." The big owl quickly walks over to me and holds out a wing. "Can you walk?" I shook my head. "Here, you can lean on me, and when we start to fly, I'll carry you in my talons."

With the help of Nico, I was able to walk the short distance to the outside world, and I saw that it was already beginning to rain. The big owl mumbles a curse to himself as we prepare to take off. I used my good leg to hop into the air, and immediately after, he grasped my back with his talons. For a second, he stumbled in the air as he balances himself with the added weight of someone else (I'm not fat, just really, really cold), but he soon flies quickly to our destination.

It didn't take long for the winds of old to pick up speed, and the heavy drops of water to come crashing down onto us. I was grateful for the assistance, I would have probably never made it this far without someone like Nico, the biggest owl I have ever seen in my life, helping me.

The chilling cold seemed to bite into my skin, and I shiver uncontrollably. I should have known that the chance of me getting an infection was very high, and now I was paying the price for my foolishness.

"Hey, Teej! How far do you think our home is?!" The big avian yells over the raging storm. If I can hear someone even through a storm, than you know that they have some pretty good vocal cords.

"Shouldn't be too far!" The barking owl loudly replies. "You know the drill, just follow me!" He goes in front of us, and Nico quickly tries to catch up with the speeding bird. We fly over trees, and I suddenly heard loud, booming thunder that almost deafened me with its sheer intensity. Thankfully, none of the trees were set alight, and soon, we were setting down into a mighty, and tall oak.

Nico gently lets go of me, and I slowly crawl up to one of the weighty walls of the tree. The storm furiously rages on while we're inside, and the two shake off the water that was collected in their feathers. Unfortunately for myself, they splashed about a quarter gallon worth of water on me. If I wasn't cold before, I'm freezing now. I cross my wings and puff out my wet feathers.

"You okay, girl?" The barking owl asks, as he checks my wound to see if it got any worse. At this point, I'd be surprised if I could still keep it. Nico goes over to another corner of the hollow and retrieves a talonful of wriggling leeches.

"Here," He unwraps my bandage and sticks them on where I was still bleeding. "After they're done, you'll probably have a couple stitches. Don't worry, it's nothing serious." He put on his best reassuring voice, which was basically him speaking in a lower volume.

"Do we have needle and thread?" TJ questions the big owl, who regrettably shook his head.

"When the storm dies down, we can go over to our neighbor for supplies." He answers, and the barking owl frowns in response.

"You haven't gone yoicks, have you? You do realize that we had to haggle her for hours _just_ for that piece of flint, right?"

"I understand she's not going to give something like that so easily, but what other choice do we have? You know we can't just leave this girl out in the wilds, she'd never make it. Not in her condition."

"I'm… right here." I weakly stated. "Do you guys... have anything to… warm me up?"

"Sorry, but we just have this," He picks up a small red blanket. "And I guess we can use this." He gives the blanket to the barking owl, although "gives" would have been too generous of a term. He comically lays the blanket on top of the owl's head, much to the ire of TJ. I meagerly giggled in response, and the barking owl quickly tried to avoid any more embarrassment in front of someone else. Nico retrieves a rag from the little corner where they put everything that they had, and stretches his talons outside, while still holding the cloth, which was now suitably wet.

TJ dutifully drapes the blanket around me, and as I snuggled deeper into its comforting warmth, Nico returns to place the rag on top of my head.

"This'll help while we wait for the storm to die down. Just, get some rest, and we'll wake you up when you feel better." The big owl says, and before I fell asleep, I wanted to ask him a very important question.

"Why are you guys… helping me?" I had no idea why they'd help someone that they didn't know at all, I didn't even give them my name, but they still saved me in my time of need. Nico warmly smirks at me, and so does TJ.

"Why shouldn't we? Just because we're strangers doesn't mean we shouldn't help you. We're all strangers to someone. And besides, I don't think I could have a clean conscience if I abandoned someone to die when I could have prevented that from happening. Now, get some sleep, uh…"

"Anna... my name is Anna." I quietly replied.

"Alright, Anna, get some rest. You'll need it for tomorrow night." And with that, I quickly fell into a deep slumber, but this time, I had a smile on my face.

 _Thanks, you two._


	18. Chapter 18: Idolized

**Hi, peeps, I'm back with two more chapters. Let's see what Alex and his compatriots are doing, yeah?**

Chapter 18: Idolized

I know I shouldn't be up this late, but if it wasn't for someone who _insisted_ that I join them in their little escapade, I'd probably still be this up. No, seriously, I was the definition of a "night owl" back in the other world, and now I'm a definite nominee for literal "day owl".

 _Old habits die hard, I guess._

In theory, I could drink myself stupid on bingle juice (No, I didn't make that name up, it's an actual drink brewed from berries that grow on the tree) and I'd fall asleep in a pinch, but I'm not the type of guy who voluntarily attempts to kill his brain cells and destroy half of his liver just for the chance to hook up with some girl who I'll forget when I wake up the next night. Granted, I don't think the stuff is strong like moonshine, or vodka, yet I've heard that there's some owls that have become addicted to the stuff. Yeah, I'd rather stick to the safe stuff, like water and bangle juice, even though the latter tastes kind of bitter, at least to me it does. Or maybe I keep getting handed the crap that nobody else wanted.

Anyways, I should get back to what I was talking about. Apparently, someone that I knew had learned that I had an affinity for reading and drawing, so he wanted me to come along with him to the library and he would read the stories that the Guardians stored throughout the years with me. He'd kind of act like my translator, because I'm still not that good at interpreting Hoolian as something other than "Cthulhu's unintelligible gurgles".

"Alex, I don't mean to rush you, but come on, keep up with me. There's this one story that I really want to read to you, and we haven't got all night." The Tyto says, and I try my best to match his pace. My leg was surely getting better, but I didn't want to push myself too far.

"Don't worry, Soren, I'm hobbling as fast as I can." I jest to the barn owl, who chuckles at my comment.

"I really do like how you treat your injuries like how you would a splinter. No, seriously, you almost lost your leg, and you think it's just an inconvenience."

"Well, it is." I plainly replied, as we maneuver our way around the maze known as the innards of the tree. It was getting easier to find my way through the place, but having someone who had been there longer than me helped, even if that person was still relatively new in comparison to me. We glide down to the wooden floor, and we hastily make our way to the library hollow. By the time we arrived, I had a distinct feeling that the sun was almost out.

 _Late intuition, perhaps._

Soren grabs a book from a neatly stacked pile, and places it on a stable surface for us to read. He made extra sure that he wasn't going too fast for me, which I appreciated.

"So, this is about the… Battle of the Ice Claws?" I inquisitively asked, looking at the title of the book on the cover. He nods, almost giddy from the excitement of reading the tale.

"It's one of the stories my da told me. It's one of his and my favorites, actually." He flips the book open, and we begin to dive into the material.

It didn't take long at all for us both to realize that this version of the tale was much darker and grittier than we had expected. It was the final battle between the Guardians and the Pure Ones, before the wretched Nazi owls went into hiding to recuperate from the loss. However, it seemed that the author didn't know about the whole child brainwashing slavery thing that they were doing behind the scenes. The narrator in the story was one of the soldiers who partook in the battle, although the name was never given.

Throughout his narration, Soren periodically stops and starts the story every now and again, sometimes repeating sentences, like the words written on the faded yellow pages didn't look real to him. Even if we'd been there, lived in that Glaux-forsaken shithole for over a month, I think he still felt it was difficult to imagine that those atrocities could ever take place in this world.

However, I was fully aware of the vicious brutality of not just this world, but the other world as well. Truth be told, humans and owls aren't that different. We kill each other for resources and land, out of hatred and racism, and more, and we never seem to learn the right lessons from war.

 _Sometimes. I wonder if anything changed at all from there to here. Of course, the species changed, but, did anything else change?_

Right as Soren hesitantly flips another page, a brown and white owl, almost the same size as us, suddenly lands directly on top of the table holding the book in place, which caused me to momentarily swear up a storm.

"Oh my frinking Glaux, don't do that shit! Why couldn't you left us a damn warning, you fucking asshole?!" I rudely exclaimed to the intruder, who I then recognized as the old whiskered screech owl known as Ezylryb, judging from the graying feathers and the blatant and a clear lack of a talon (Just don't look at it for too long, Alex, you might burn your eyes out, or just vomit, whichever one isn't good). Fortunately, or whatever, I don't discriminate. I'll swear to pretty much everyone and anyone, barring a few exceptions. The owl belts out a hearty and sort of wheezing laugh, seemingly amused with my suffering, and choice of words.

"Always expect the unexpected, lad. Sometimes you can't beat people with words, even if you use the worse ones you know." He says with a sly smirk. "Now, what are you two doing up at this hour? It's almost first light."

"We were reading this, sir." Soren answers, tapping a talon on the paper. "Battle of the Ice Claws, it's my da's favorite story, he liked to tell it to us before we went to bed."

"Well, your da had good taste in authors. Are you two enjoying it?"

"Honestly, it's not at all like how my da told it."

 _Of course not, Soren. You were kids, he obviously cherry picked the good parts, and left the rest._

"Really?" The screech owl quizzically questions. "How did your da tell it?" Soren sighs, before telling him.

"Well, he always made it seem heroic, you know? Like this great victory that would be told for generations and generations. And, in these chronicles, the battle just sounds…"

"Like Hagsmire?" The haggard screech owl finished Soren's thought for him, and the Tyto nodded. "Alright, I think it's about time that you two get some shuteye." He turns to me, those green eyes, like looking at an older grizzled version of Matt. "Especially you, lad. Alex, was it? You made quite the fuss to me about how eager you were to start training, you wouldn't want to to be late on the first night because you slept in, would you?"

"I'll be fine, my sleep schedule has always been messed up." I said dismissively, the issue wasn't that important to me. Soren closed the book and placed it back on one the stacks of books.

"Well, I'm going to my hollow. Good light, Alex," The barn owl tiredly yawned to me, stretching his wings. "Good light, sir." He formally addresses the old screech owl, bowing his head. Soren takes off and leaves me alone with Ezylryb, who for some reason was still here with me. Trying to ignore his presence, I decided that I wanted to read something else, preferably something that wasn't about war and death, before I went to bed. Carefully, I retrieve another book from a different row of books, one that was thankfully a bit more tame.

It was more about all of the different metals and ores that the Guardians knew of, and some of their physical properties, like density and luster. It was an interesting read, even if it wasn't quite as exciting as what we were reading before, but then again, nobody gets killed or brutally tortured/maimed in this book. Gold was still gold, iron was still iron, but strangely, the name for something like an amalgamation of metals like nickel and copper, was named Mu metal.

I got halfway through the book before I decided that I should really get to bed by now. The whiskered screech owl doesn't say anything as he quietly reads another book on his own desk, and I take my leave.

I fly off and go up to the higher levels of the tree, using the natural landmarks that I had kept in my mind when I first arrived in here as a guide. Twisting and turning around the tree's vines and roots, I did eventually get to my own hollow. I say, "my own hollow", but really, I'm fooling nobody.

I fought tooth and nail for the chance to train with the rest of my friends, and unfortunately, despite my best efforts to persuade the higher-ups of the tree to let me share a hollow with Matt or Cato, I instead was put in… well, someone else's. They wanted someone who could watch over me until I was fully healed, and that someone was Gylfie. Of course she didn't object to me being her temporary hollow mate, but I felt as if I was being treated like a child, who couldn't go five feet away from a chaperone. Still, there are people _way_ worse than the elf owl that they could've picked. I'm grateful that they didn't pick someone like Twilight, or Glaux-forbid Digger.

I try to stealthily enter the hollow, tip toeing my way to my bed on the other side. I immediately noticed that the elf owl was still up, and was currently studying for her favorite chaw, Navigation. I give up trying to Assassin's Creed my way inside, and I unceremoniously flop on my nest bed.

"Have fun with Soren?" She asks, her eyes not moving up as she continued to read one of her books. I let out the air I was holding in my lungs, adjusting my position on the bed for the sweet spot.

"I'm not sure if that's the right term I would use." I said.

"So… not fun?" She questions with a tiny smirk on her face.

"It's complicated, I mean we went in there expecting that we'd read something that wasn't… you know, based on real life." Her face lights up in realization, looking up at me and away from her work.

"So what you're saying is, that you guys found out the truth about one of the stories?"

"Yeah. On a side note, we met Ezylryb while we were reading." I added.

"How'd that go?" She inquired, and I was hesitant to tell her what I did. But eventually I mustered the courage to relinquish the details.

"Okay, before I say anything else, let it be known that he scared the living soul out of me. And I might have gotten a little on the… abrasive side with him."

"Alex, please don't beat around the bush, not when I'm around at least." She grins, apparently understanding what I had done before the words came out of my beak. "Count how many swears you cursed to him."

"Two." I weakly answered, although she obviously didn't believe me. "Three." I upped the ante, yet she merely gave me a face that simply said "I don't believe that for one second."

"Racdrops! I said five, you happy now?!" I exclaimed, and she giggles in short lived hysteria.

"Oh my Glaux, Alex. You are very lucky that he also has quite the… expansive vocabulary. Anyone else and you might have gotten a flint mop."

"Two words, thicker skin. It's not my fault people get offended because I say them and their poor ears just can't accept the things they hear." I try once again to get that one spot on the bed, and to my relief, I managed to locate it. She smiles as she gets back to her work, and then she puts a wing around her beak, seemingly stifling another churr from escaping her mouth. "What?"

"I'm just remembering the first time I heard you swore, I think it was back at the eggorium. Although, I'm having trouble recalling what exactly you said when they told you you had to roost on the eggs."

 _I think I know what I said, and thankfully, this isn't a PG-13 movie. So, screw it._

"Do you dunderheads have any sprinking idea how dumb that idea is? Look, that Tyto over there can do it, because this is absolutely ridiculous! Soren, get your ass over here, I'm not doing this shit!" I recite from my memory, as I act out the scenario with gestures. "Is that what I said?"

"Something like that, yeah." She replies, and fails to contain her laughter from erupting. "I'm sorry, it's just funny that you wanted Soren to do it, rather than myself."

"Well, how many eggs could _you_ roost on in there?"

"Just one."

"There you go. Besides, I was kind of frinked off about Matt picking flecks that day. I might have let out my frustrations on the wrong person." I admitted to the elf owl, and she nodded, understanding the situation we were put in. Gylfie wasn't the judgmental type anyway.

She closes the book and pushes it away from her, done with studying for the time being. She yawns and cracks her neck, settling down in her own nest.

"Alright, well, Good light, Alex." She quietly mutters, before closing her eyes.

"Good light, Gylfie." I wished her, and while it took some time, I had also fallen asleep. If what Ezylryb was saying was correct, I'd need the energy for tomorrow night. And he was right, I didn't want to be late. That's like showing up hours late to join the Marine Corps in nothing but your underwear. It's not something you'd ever want to do.

The real world soon became the dream world, and the setting quickly turned into a something that I could not forget. It was a cool summer evening, with the wind lightly breezing over me. I was standing on a surface that was soft and strangely warm, and I realized that it was sand. As I walked on the grainy ground, I heard the sounds of water crashing on the shore. The waves periodically went back and forth, and then I saw a familiar figure in the distance.

I aimlessly stroll up to the Tyto, who was lazily lying down on the sand, gazing up into the night sky. He wordlessly invites me to sit down with him, and I oblige, setting down on the sandy beach. I knew what this place was, it was Hawaii, The Islands of Aloha. Or the other, more direct nickname, Paradise. I can see why Daniel would pick this memory as a background for us, it's very peaceful and calming.

" **You ever wonder if the stars in the sky are, well, different places that people live in?"** He asks, and then points to a bright blue one that shined like a diamond. " **Like that one, what if there's another entirely different world that we just can't get to?"**

"Well, I made it here, didn't I?" I slyly remarked, and he rolls in eyes, unamused.

" **So, if we were to go on that logic, everyone that perished in their own world will rebirth in another one. Alex, that wouldn't make much sense. Pretty soon, you'd have a world comprised of only those type of people. Not to mention if one person who did the same thing as you did, and then died in the next world they rebirthed in, you'd have a cycle of life and death that'd go on forever and ever."**

"Good point." I mumble. "Why are you bringing this up, though?" He sighs, turning his eyes to me.

" **You ever miss being a human? Do you miss your family, your love interests, friends and well, everything?"**

"Sometimes, I find myself getting nostalgic for those times, and sometimes I do miss my family, but… well, I'm dead, Daniel. At least in that world. There's no point in trying to go back to the way things used to be."

" **But,"** The silver owl interjects. " **What if there** _ **was**_ **a way back to the human world? Would you consider going back, even if it was only for a couple days?"**

"I don't know," I truthfully admitted, I wasn't sure if I wanted to go back. Sure, I could go back home, but I'd leave this one behind. "Maybe." I said, unsuringly.

" **Okay, so if you could go back, would you want to be something else? Like maybe a wolf or, perhaps a cardinal?"**

"A dancing penguin, Daniel, I don't frinking know! Why're you asking me these weird questions?" I inquired the silver owl.

" **I've just been thinking, and** _ **if**_ **transportation between different worlds were possible, it's likely that you'd leave your own body and your consciousness would transfer into another body in the world that you wanted to go to."** He rubbed his chin with a wing, lost in thought for a moment.

"So… where would my old body be if I left for that other world?"

" **That's what I'm trying to figure out too. It's possible that your old body would simply remain in the original world, but then there's quite a few problems with that."**

"What _kind_ of problems?" I queried, becoming more intrigued with his theoretical musings.

" **Well, imagine if another person were to discover the same method of transportation in another world, and they wanted to go to your's. Wouldn't it be easier for that person to inhabit your husk of a body instead of someone who was still living? And also, how long would your body live for while you're gone?"**

"So, what you're saying is, that the risks of making it to another world would be too great, if you wanted to stay whoever you were when and if you come back?" I said, and he slowly nodded.

" **Yeah, that's why I asked you if you missed anybody back home."**

"Let's just talk about something else." I wanted to change the subject to something a little less up there, and based on real life. "Did you happen to see what went down with me and Soren?" He devilishly smirks, and I instantly regretted bringing up the event.

" **Of course, you cursed out a old man, Alex. You feel proud about that?"**

"He scared me half to death! How else was I supposed to react to that?"

" **I don't know, politely tell him that he shouldn't do that."** The silver owl shrugged his shoulders. " **He just wanted to know want you were reading."**

"I don't care! I could just do the same thing to him. Karma's a major bitch."

" **I bet you know a thing or two about that, right?"**

"Alright, just, shut up, it's time to put those wings up." I concluded, and then I growled intimidatingly. Before Daniel could understand what I meant, I proceeded to body slam the Tyto. He soon went along with my plan, and we playfully fought on the beach of Oahu for who knows how long, complete with a bunch of slaps to the face. We tossed and toiled on the sand, all the while laughing at our childish behavior. We both needed some good old fun, reducing our stress and what not. I thought of it as payback for his behavior, and he probably thought the same.

However, all good things must come to an end, and I was eventually forced to return back to the waking world. I said my goodbyes to the owl, and I soon found myself back at Gylfie's hollow. I blearily opened my eyes, rubbing them with my wings to shake off Mr. Sandman's gift from last night. I stretch my limbs like how a cat would do, and I saw that the elf owl was still asleep. I sneakily sauntered over to her, and I tried to wake her up.

"Gylfie," I whispered. "Time to get up, come on." Despite my attempt to force her out of her slumber, she refused to cooperate. I decided that I would try something a bit more… nefarious, instead.

"Gylfie!" I raised my voice, and I tried to make it seem like I was the crazy burrowing owl, who had come into her hollow for a not so subtle confession. "I murdered Soren, we gotta go, now!" I made sure that I spoke almost directly into her ear, and she was starting to come to.

"Wh- what?" She tiredly muttered, half asleep. It took a lot of willpower to keep up the act, yet I was going to see it through to the end.

"I killed that little brat, oh, he wouldn't stop talking about how he wanted to ask you out, so I wanted to get to you before he could. Now, come on, it's only a matter of time before they find out!" Sadly, she had realized that I had been pulling her leg.

"Alex, if Digger wanted to ask me out, he'd do it regardless if I had already been taken. Although… that _was_ a good impression." She murmurs, with a slight smirk on her beak. "You're just missing that little 'lilt' that he has."

"Well, at least I got you up." I say, holding my wing out for her to take. She was quick to grab it, and I easily lifted her up from her bed. "You wanna eat tweener before we go?"

"No," She shook her head. "What we're doing tonight, we shouldn't really eat anything." I turn my head, confused. I wasn't really informed of what my first night would entail.

"What _are_ we doing, tonight?"

"Weather interpretation." She flatly told me.

"I knew that part. But, which natural disaster are we going to go through? Earthquake, tsunami, hurricane, volcano eruption, uh, what else?" I asked, and she churred at my assumptions.

"None of those, I'm afraid. I guess you'll just have to find out on your own when we leave." She smugly states, and I grumble, hoping that she would have spilled the beans. "We should get going, Ezylryb doesn't really like it when his students come late."

I took her word for it, and we hastily went outside, and we began to go up higher and higher to where the whiskered screech owl's "classroom" was. Hopefully, we would make it in time. As we climbed to nearly the top of the grand tree, we noticed that a few other owls had already arrived before us. We perched on one of the thick branches of the tree, next to a great grey owl. He waved at the two of us, ending his conversation with the substantially smaller burrowing owl.

"So, the two nest mates finally arrive." The great grey sarcastically greeted, and we both groaned, rolling our eyes. "I was just talking to Digger about this, but what'd you guys think about my new song?" He asked, and while he didn't have his signature lute, he started to whistle a tune to us. Surprisingly, it sounded nice, although to Digger, he looked like he was about to tear out his feathers.

"Sounds lovely, Twilight." The elf owl complemented when he was done. "Where's Soren and… you know who?"

"Probably pretending it's mating season in his hollow." The burrowing owl answers, and while the image of someone that I knew doing, _that,_ was on the verge of being burned into my brain, I did not know who the second person they were talking about was.

"You know… who?" I question.

"Have you ever seen a short eared owl around here before? With an ego bigger than my friend here?" Digger points to Twilight, and the great grey was offended by his comment. "She's got the hots for him, I tell you."

"I wouldn't say that, Digger." Gylfie said, shaking a wing unsuredly. "She's more… dignified, and well..."

"She's vain, shallow, and a stuck up bitch?" I finished her train of thought for her.

"Thank you, Alex, for your eloquent interpretation of her personality." Twilight caustically commented. "I'm glad that I will never have to compete with you on wordsmithing."

"Is it not true?" I replied. "Fine, I'll reserve my feelings on the matter until I formally meet this owl, how's that sound?"

"You'll find out pretty soon." Digger quietly remarked, and right on time, I saw two owls fly up to us. It was the young Tyto, and the presumably rude short eared owl, that oddly had what seemed to be eyeliner around her yellow eyes.

"So, this is the guy you were talking about," She says to Soren, as she looks me over for, something. "Alex, is it? It's nice to finally meet you." She outstretches her talons for a shake, and I took them with mine. Her grip was strangely firm, but at least she didn't give me a dead hand. Or feet, whatever.

"To what I may owe this pleasure to?" I try my best to impersonate a gentleman, my voice becoming more refined and almost without a trace of Southern twang.

"Otulissa." She proudly answers, as if her own name elicited a sense of honor and nobility when it was uttered. "I understand that you're fresh out the infirmary, but, just try not to slow us down."

 _Oh, I think I'm starting to see, now. Wow, Soren's taste in women was as strange and jarring as the mechanics of quantum physics._

Suddenly, our conversation was interrupted by the arrival of another avian, who swooped down on another branch adjacent to the one we perched on.

"Alright, ladies and gents, it seems that everybody is here. Tonight, is the night where you will learn to really fly." He proclaims, and points directly behind us. "Over yonder, is where I've recently discovered a good starter storm for you all. Do any of you have questions before we head off?"

"I've got one." I said, raising a wing. "Would we be in any danger in this storm?" I hoped that I wouldn't have a repeat when I came in to the tree like last time. Ezylryb shook his head.

"Shouldn't be, but that's the beauty of this chaw. Weather is a fickle mistress, and if you are tapped for this chaw, you'll have to understand its innate unpredictability."

"Sir, I do believe I have another question." Twilight raises his own wing. "Am I allowed to bring my precious lute to this adventure?"

"No, lad, unless you don't want it anymore, you cannot bring most items into any kind of situation with a chance of strong winds. Just bring your brain and your gizzard, and you'll be fine." Ezylryb answers the great grey. "Any more questions?" He asks, and when nobody else speaks up, he continues. "Alright, follow my lead." He orders, and he skillfully dismounts off the branch and flies directly above us. One after one, we all do the same, and as usual, I was the last one to take off.

We soar high above the ocean below us, and the moon was partially shrouded by the clouds in the night sky. I didn't know how long exactly we were flying for, but all I did know was that my wings were becoming sore. Sometimes, I could rely on updrafts to keep me up in the air without much effort on my part, but for tonight, I had to rely mostly on my feathery limbs to keep me aloft.

Eventually, I felt drops of water soak into my feathers. The drops first came in dispersed bundles, and then they quickly picked up in their size and power. Soon, we were starting to become drenched in rain. And from what I could tell, practically nobody was enjoying the experience. Well, Ezylryb was, but that's a given.

"Feel the gutters!" The owl shouted over the storm's intense roars. "The currents in the rain! A scupper! A swillage! Baggywrinkles!" He yells, doing these strange maneuvers in the air that vaguely resembled some of Matt's moves, although they were far less complicated and over the top.

"'Baggywrinkles'"? The short eared owl confusingly exclaimed. "He could have at least given us a vocabulary list." At that point, the whiskered screech owl flies closer to Otulissa.

"Don't be so negative, lass! This, this is the way to learn!" He lets out a laugh that penetrates through the wind rushing in our ears, flying back to the front of our group.

"Oh, Yeah!" The burrowing owl yells. "Because this is how I want to learn, in a monsoon!"

"Digger, you're scaring me." I yell back at him. "You're making sense!"

"Clone, don't get me started! I swear, I'll kill you all from beyond the grave if I die here!"

 _There's the psychotic and crazy burrowing owl I knew._

"That's enough guff from you two!" Ezylryb interjected. "Just listen to my voice, The air currents warm in different ways, you see... ...from the sky to the ocean. You can't fight them. You have to feel them with your gizzards."

 _That's my problem, though. I don't have one, it's either that or it's just permanently mute. But, well, Daniel's a good replacement. Too bad that lazy bird isn't here right now._

Soren and Ezylryb were out in front, and then the screech owl seemed to have spotted something in the distance.

"Aha! You see that one?" Ezylryb shouts, and well, I don't know how to really explain it. It was like the eye of a hurricane, or a tornado. I had seen it, but I was too fearful to actually venture into it. But the Tyto was left unphased by the sight, and he began to fly closer and closer to it. "Soren, you see it?!" He loudly inquired. "Right there, go for it!"

Soren continued to move forward, as we could only watch in awe as he effortlessly flies inside the spiraling eye. He unconsciously flips over, and then he seemed to have realized that what he was doing was borderline exhilarating. But suddenly, he began to fall closer and closer to the ocean, and I knew what I had to do. There was no questions to be asked, nothing. Never again would someone be put in the same situation as I was, never again.

 _I might not be able to save myself, but I'm damn sure going to save him._

The world goes abnormally quiet, as I fold my wings to rapidly increase my speed, diving straight down to rescue the barn owl. My vision was beginning to fade, the corners turning black, yet I kept going regardless. I focused my sight to only Soren, and to my stark horror, he was _very_ close to the roaring waves below me. However, with a sudden burst of speed, I had managed to close the distance, and I quickly wrapped my talons around the Tyto's body, throwing him higher into the air and preventing him from suffering an untimely demise.

My heart beats like a tribal drum in my chest, pounding in my ears as I breathed erratically. Ezylryb and the rest of the group fly over to me, and the ryb tells everyone that the class was officially over with for the night. The screech owl stays behind for a moment, and says something to the two of us.

"You two, when we get back, come to my hollow." He told us, and I barely nod my head. No words needed to have been said, I could tell that they were both grateful for the assistance. I don't know why, but I felt a warm feeling from deep within me arise. And I had to wonder, was this what it was like for that one guardian that saved me? Or that one owl that saved me from the raging forest fire? Because if so, I could get used to this.

As the rain let up, and the moon was starting to reveal itself from behind the thick clouds, we eventually made our way to the tree, that still looked as grand as ever. Everyone else went their separate ways, while I followed Soren into the near top of the tree. We went inside a decent sized hollow; it was definitely bigger than Gylfie's. Ezylryb was busy stoking the flames of a small fire pit that in the middle of his hollow. Behind him were a shelf full of books, perhaps his own personal collection?

"I don't even know what I did with it," Soren seemed to be talking more to himself, rather than us. "I don't know what happened. What'd I even do? We flew for so long, so far, to get here and it was _nothing_ like that."

"You've got no reason to worry, boy," Ezylryb assured, looking at the barn owl with a softened expression. "I will confess, I guided you into that twister on purpose. I wanted to test your gizzard, and you were, exemplary." He then turns to me. "And you, Alex, That lightning fast speed, coupled with that split second decision you made to help your friend in his time of need was a sight to see. You were both exemplary. " However, Soren did not take the complement at face value.

"'Exemplary'? No, I had my damn wings nearly ripped off! If it wasn't for Alex, I don't think I could have recovered in time. My head was just saying to do one thing, and my gizzard was saying to do another." Soren swearing was sort of off putting to me, but, for this instance, I could let that slip by.

"And you trusted your head," Ezylryb said, and was finished with his fire stoking. He went behind him and picked up a feather pen, and began to scribble down in one of his books. "That's when you failed."

We both take a gander at what he was writing, and while I couldn't understand what exactly he was jotting down, He did eventually finish, pressing a stamp on one corner of the book. The red insignia looked familiar to me, and soon, we both realized where we had seen it from. It was from the book about the Battle of the Ice Claws.

"Wait, is that your mark?" Soren questioned, and Ezylryb momentarily stopped writing.

"What, this? I suppose it is." He shrugged nonchalantly, returning back to his work.

"So, you wrote the Chronicle of The Battle of the Ice Claws?"

"I… I think so," The screech owl mutters. "Well actually, yes, I did."

"Were you there?" Soren was insistent on getting his background information, while I merely listened to their conversation.

"Yes." He simply stated.

"What, as a scribe?" The barn owl inquires, and the screech owl shakes his head.

"Well, no. As a soldier, as I guess you could say the… leader of all the soldiers."

 _Wait,_ _ **he's**_ _Lyze of Kiel?_

"You're... Lyze of Kiel?" We had both synchronized our bewilderment and shock.

"Um, yes." The avian had uncomfortably fidgeted with his quill, probably not sure what to do.

"You're Lyze of Kiel." Soren had repeated the words, almost as if he wasn't sure if what we heard was true or not.

"Yes. Don't wear it out."

I had slowly looked over to where Soren had his eyes set upon, which was a pair of lonely battle claws, sitting in a corner all by itself. At first, I paid no heed to it, but now, I wanted to know why he had discarded his battle claws. And so did Soren.

"But…" Soren had trailed off, and the screech owl lets go of his pen.

"That old thing? It's only good for gathering coals now."

"But, why go as Ezylryb?" Soren asked.

"All of the owls in the Tree know who I am."

"But you're…" The barn owl was then interrupted by the screech owl.

"My days and nights as Lyze are well behind me. The battle is only a distant memory, except funnily enough, for young owlets like you."

"Why didn't you tell me, tell us?" Soren questioned, determined to figure out the truth. However, the old owl only asked another question instead.

"What difference does it make with what I call myself?"

"Because Lyze of Kiel was my hero!" Soren snapped harshly at the screech owl, who was temporarily taken back before sarcastically retorting.

"Well, fancy it must be hard meeting your hero and seeing that he's real and not a myth."

"You're just not what I expected." Soren depressingly murmured, and then the screech owl had a fiery gleam in his eyes, rivaling the real smoldering fire in the hollow and I knew that the man was officially frinked off.

"What _did_ you expect? Some Tyto alba with gleaming armor and battle claws, the moon rising behind him? Well, this is what it looks like when you've actually fought in battle." He shows us his multiple scars spread across his body, and even his distinct lack of a talon. "Lad, take one look at your friend, and another at me. _This_ is what battle does to owls like us. It's not glorious, it's not beautiful, bloody Hagsmire, it's not even heroic! It's merely doing what's right, over and over and over again. Even if someday, you look like this."

Just then, we could hear a bell ring, and loud commotion outside the hollow, and Ezylryb's wizened eyes widened.

"Something's wrong. Come on, you two." We left the hollow, and what I saw was an instant reminder of bygone times. A reminder that foretold something terrible.


	19. Chapter 19:The New Arrivals

Chapter 19: The New Arrivals

Ezylryb had went out in front of us with much haste, and as we flew to where we had heard all those voices, with a sizeable number of owls around the platform, we saw a lone owl flying closer to the tree, holding something in his talons. Then we heard the newcomer call out to us.

"Downed owlets! Downed owlets, come fast!" The mysterious stranger landed close by, setting the thing in his talons, which was a little puffball of feathers. I had hoped I would never see those eyes again, but there they were, soulless, lifeless, and glazed over.

 _So this must be Allomere, the ryb for search and rescue._

The grizzled great grey owl continued to request for help.

"Get some help here, these owlets need attention, immediately." The owl ordered, and surprisingly, the ryb for Ga'hoology had shown up. But there was no time for questions, only action.

"Fetch it quick!" She commanded to a few other owls that were around, and at that point, we both saw Otulissa, and we quickly approached her to for some much needed information.

"Umm, do you know what the hag is going on?" I asked the short eared owl, and thankfully, she did.

"Lord Allomere rescued four owls in the Beaks, It looks like they're all hurt pretty bad. I think he ran into some of your Pure Ones." For a moment, she remorsefully frowned, looking back at Soren. "You know, I never really believed you before… all this."

"No, that's alright. Heh, I wouldn't have believed myself either." Soren awkwardly joked to her, and suddenly, we all heard a voice cry out.

"Soren! Soren!" The voice belonged to none other than his snake nurse friend person (I don't know), rushing up to the Tyto with a anxious look on her face. "Come fast, It's Eglantine!"

The barn owl quickly nodded, and followed the pink snake through the crowd of owls, and I decided to leave the scene before things got too crowded. I hurried to the infirmary, maybe I could help Matt and the others with these newcomers. Rushing through the cavernous vines and hallways of the tree, I had eventually made it to the owl hospital.

The first thing I noticed when I entered the infirmary was the scent of a strong alcoholic mixture that brought back a bad memory. It seemed that someone was using medicine, and quite a bit of it. Then I saw the screech owl and the horned owl, who were both tending to different patients. I went up to Matt, who was currently disinfecting a pretty nasty wound on a barely conscious mummified and almost malnourished barred owl.

"Oh, Alex! Could you bring me another bandage from over there?" He questioned, pointing to a small table. I quickly make my way to the table and grab the bandage in my talons. I hand the white cloth to Matt, who thanked me, and began to wrap it around the owl's wound, which was around its right eye.

"Did anybody tell you what exactly happened to this guy?" I inquired.

"Not really, other than the fact that Allomere found him up in The Beaks along with its companion and the two owlets. But, I think I might have an idea." The screech owl replied, and I pressed him on for details.

"So… What is it?"

"Alex, you can't really see them, but most of his injuries are too clean cut to have been from the talons of an owl, and way too deep. So, I've come to the conclusion that…"

"He was in a fight with some Pure Ones, wasn't he?" I sighed, and the screech owl sadly nodded.

"Yeah, and while I'm no expert, I don't think he'll be able to see anymore out of this eye."

I then look over to Mirah's patient, and while the owl didn't look quite as bad as the barred owl, it was still covered in bloody bandages.

"So, is that the other owl he found up there? That guy's friend?" I wondered.

"Uh huh. They're both very lucky, to be honest." The screech owl had finished wrapping the thick bandage around the barred owl's eye, and suddenly, the avian started to slowly speak.

"Where… where's, everybody?" The barred owl had weakly muttered, his voice scratchy and his volume was barely above a whisper.

"Don't worry," Matt's calming tone sounded a lot like when I was in the barred owl's position. "You're safe, now. Your friend is right over there, and we're doing the best we can to make sure it stays that way."

"No," The barred owl choked up. "Where's… Li, Where's… An...na?" He began to cough loudly, resembling the sounds of myself when I was in that position. When he was done, Matt had put a wing on his beak, shushing him.

"It'll be alright, just try to get some sleep, and we'll figure out where they are when you're better, okay?"

The mummy barred owl almost imperceptibly nodded, before closing his eye and slowly, he fell asleep. Matt had sighed in relief, wiping his own eyes with a wing.

"Thanks Alex, you know, for coming. Having an extra pair of wings helps a lot around here."

"No prob, Bob. I just thought you'd need the help when I saw Allomere come in." I replied with a smile. Just then, before I could continue the conversation, two owls came in the infirmary with a owlish gurney, and I saw that the person lying in it was a small barn owl, and once again, they had those glossed over eyes.

The owl wasn't severely injured like the other two owls in here, but that didn't change the fact that it was moon blinked. And when Soren and his nest snake came in, with the most sullen expressions on their faces, I realized that this little owl was his sister, Eglantine. The Pure Ones had no doubt captured her, and they had done an unforgivable act to her.

I edged closer to the small group, as Soren appeared to be on the verge of tears. Matt went to help Mirah with the other patient.

"Eglantine, you can't even begin to understand how badly I want to trade places with you. I really would, I wish it was me lying there, instead of you." He shakily whispered to the young owl. The pink snake slithered her way closer to Soren, and put her head on the barn owl to soothe his pain.

"Oh, Soren." She quietly said, her slit snake eyes were teary.

"Because then you'd see this place for yourself, Eg. Da's stories, they're true, they're all true. The Guardians, The Ga'Hoole tree, and even Lyze of Kiel himself, he's real. They're all real." He started to clench his wing, the tears in his eyes falling freely. "Why? Why would they do this to her?! She doesn't deserve this! No one does..."

" **He's right about that, you know."** A voice says, taking me by surprise for a second. I turn around to see Daniel, looking at Soren crying, with his nest snake protectively coiling herself around him. " **Alex, can I ask you something? Do you trust me?"**

"Of course I do." I whisper to the ethereal silver owl. "What do you want to do?"

" **I think I know how to bring her back."**

"You do?" I quietly exclaim, and the owl nods.

" **Yeah, and well, I don't know how else to put it, I'm going to have to borrow your body."**

"Borrow… my body? You can do that?" I incredulously ask the silver owl, shocked that he could ever do such a thing.

" **I don't know if this'll work in the first place, but, I can't just sit around and wait for you to do everything. Now, just hold out your wing."** He commands, extending his own wing. I place my wing in his, and the most peculiar feeling I have ever felt was beset upon me. It seemed like I was getting farther and farther away from the world, and... I fell for so long in the everlasting darkness. However, in the far distance, I could see what I was seeing. Or, rather, what Daniel was seeing.

 _Talk about a backseat driver._

Daniel had steadily walked his way up to the weeping barn owl, and Soren had looked up at him, seemingly surprised.

"Alex, what's wrong with… your eye?" He had managed to say through the tears.

" **I'm not Alex, Soren. But that doesn't matter. Do you love your sister?"**

"More than anything." Soren replied, angered that someone would have the audacity to ask something like that to him.

" **Then stand back, I don't want anything to happen to you guys should anything go wrong."** Daniel made his way to the moon blinked owl and then he placed his wing on the avian's forehead. For a moment, nothing happened, but suddenly, I could feel my left eye begin to burn like it was cast alight with the flames of the sun. I tried to ignore the pain, hoping that what I was going through would save Eglantine's life, yet I couldn't keep the small scream of pain from escaping my beak.

The pain lasted for far too long for my liking, the searing, scorching pain did not let up, but eventually, Daniel had released his hold on the young owl. I had regained control of my body, and the first thing I did was fall down on the floor.

"Alex, are you okay?!" Matt questioned, dragging me to the nearest bed. I could not give an answer, even if I tried my hardest. The words would not form in my throat. But then, I heard another voice, one that I did not know, begin to speak.

"Soren, you promised." It childishly whined. I moved my head back up, and I saw that Eglantine had returned to us. Whatever Daniel did, worked.

"Eg?" The barn owl whispered in disbelief.

"You promised I could be Lyze on the next go."

Immediately, Soren enveloped his sister in a brotherly hug, crying even more, and she was left completely confused.

"Eglantine, Eglantine, you're back, I thought I lost you!" The Tyto all but whispered in a somber tone.

"Soren? Mrs. P?" She quizzically looked at the two. "Where are we? Why are you crying, Soren? Did I… do something wrong?"

"Of course not, Eg." Soren sniffed before continuing. "You made us all very sad when you left… but you're back now. That's all that matters. And, to answer your question, we're… in the Guardian's Tree. Just, look around, Eg. We made it, it's real." The barn owl said when he finally let go of his sister.

"But, That can't be." Eglantine murmured. "Kludd, he's still…"

"Kludd was wrong. Da was right. He was right all along, Eg." Soren told his sister.

"No, I mean Kludd was there. With me. He did this to me, Soren. He's… one of them." Soren shook his head, still in denial over the fact that his older brother was a Pure One, and was perfectly capable of doing atrocious acts.

"He what? No. No, Eg. Look, you must be confused. He wouldn't do that. Well, thank Glaux Allomere rescued you."

"No, Soren, I wasn't rescued. Kludd gave me to that owl that brought me here."

"No, Eg, no. That's impossible. I mean, that would mean that Allomere would have to be a... Be a traitor." At that moment, we all realized the truth of the matter, but that didn't make things any better. Allomere was one of the Rybs of the tree, for Glaux's sake, how could _he_ be a traitor? But then again, Eglantine doesn't look like she could lie to save her own life.

"Oh, Glaux, damn it! It's a trap!" Soren had furiously yelled, and the two were clearly surprised that he would use such language. He hurriedly went up to me and Matt. "Can you walk, Alex? Or, whoever you are?"

"I think I can." I said, getting back up on my feet. "What's the plan?"

"I'll gather everyone I can and we'll meet up in my hollow, just hurry!" He turns to Matt, who was still trying to comprehend what had just happened. "Matt, do you know where Cato is?" The screech owl shakes himself back to the living world, and nods.

"I think so, he should probably be with Dewlap tonight."

"Good," The Tyto replies, before going back to Mrs. P and Eglantine. "Mrs. P, please, keep Eg safe for me, okay?" The snake only nods. "And Sis, whatever happens, I love you." He gave a goodbye hug to his sister, and then he headed outside the infirmary. Matt and I quickly followed him, and then we made our way down to the Ga'hoology hollow. We brushed past the dozens of owls in our way, and we ran inside the classroom. Thankfully, it seemed as if the ryb wasn't there, so there'd be no objections to us taking Cato out of it.

"Cato!" I yelled out to the crow, who was previously writing on a piece of paper, but stopped when he heard my voice. He walked to us.

"What's going on, Alex? I mean, why're you guys here? I thought you didn't like Ga'hoology that much."

"There's no time to explain, Cato, just come with us!" I grabbed him by the wing, and practically dragged his ass back outside.

"Uh, Is this about how I messed up your journal?" He innocently questioned as we rushed to Soren's hollow.

"You messed up my journal?!" I asked, forgetting my sense of urgency for a second. "Aw, never mind, just keep up!"

We dashed our way past more owls, and by the time we had made it to his hollow, we had seen that a few of our friends had arrived before us. Digger and Twilight were busy with another one of their pointless arguments, and Gylfie was quick to greet us.

"There you guys are!" She said. "We were told to meet in Soren's hollow, but he didn't tell us why."

"Same here." Twilight popped in the conversation, done with the argument for awhile.

"I'm sorry, but we'll have to wait on him to get back. He's the one with the plan, not us." I told them, and Cato peered at me with intrigue.

"He'd better have a good reason for interrupting our break time. If it's not the Tree going into chaos because of those owlets, I can't even eat those scrumptious caterpillars." Digger frustratingly growled in irritation, his priorities just as screwed up as himself.

Fortunately for all of us, we were spared the wrath of the burrowing owl by the arrival of two other owls. Soren and Otulissa had made their way through the tree, and entered the hollow, which was now getting a bit crowded. Soren was now wielding only one battle claw on his right talons.

 _Wonder where he got that from._

"So, seems like everyone's here," Soren began, standing in the middle of the hollow. "I've brought you all here because there's nobody else I can trust in this tree."

"Soren, why'd you want us?" Cato curiously questioned the barn owl.

"Yeah, is something wrong?" Gylfie anxiously asked.

"Unfortunately, something is _very_ wrong. We don't have much time, so I'll say this right now: Allomere is a traitor, and he's leading the Guardians into a trap."

Gylfie and Otulissa gasped in shock, Digger seemed to be unaffected by the revelation, like he was totally expecting the owl to betray us, or maybe he didn't care, Matt and Cato were quite interested in his claim, and Twilight, had dared to question Soren's declaration.

"Have you been drinking too much bingle Juice, Soren? I know Allomere isn't the nicest owl in this tree, not by a long shot, but your claim is a bit on the ludicrous side."

"I know what I heard, Twilight!" Soren angrily retorted. "Eglantine was given to Allomere by my, by another owl, and I _know_ she would _never_ lie about that. I don't know why he's betraying the Guardians, but I know for a fact that he's treacherous scum."

"So, what do you want us to do?" Cato hesitantly inquired, a little afraid of the barn owl's demeanor.

"We gotta save the Guardians. We gotta save Lyze and the others." At that moment, Matt had realized that his hero was right here, all along.

"Lyze?! Lyze of Kiel?"

"Yes, Matt, Lyze of Kiel is in danger. Call him whatever you want, Lyze or Ezylryb. What matters is that we have to go rescue them."

"But, I'm not good in a fight," Cato sadly replied. "Why'd you need me for?"

"Yeah, we'd never set one foot in a war zone for someone we barely know." Digger added in his two cents.

"Alright, I know that some of us have doubts about our skills. And I know that some of us might not have a strong attachment to Lyze and the others. But that doesn't matter." Soren turns to Digger and Twilight. "Didn't you guys say that you'd love to be in a legend one day?"

"Of course we did," Digger replies. "We don't wanna die for that to happen."

" _Nobody_ is going to die. And you know why? Because we're a band, a strong squadron of owls. And you know what they say, 'Birds of a feather, always stick together'. I need people who know how to navigate, and Gylfie and Cato are the perfect ones for that job. I need people who won't hesitate in a fight, people who can defend their beliefs with undying courage and bravery, and every one of you can do just that. I need, _all_ of you." Soren spoke like the leader I could never be, and his uplifting speech was very motivating.

"Please, do this for the Guardians. Do this for Ezylryb. Do it for our kin, do it for me. Are you guys with me?"

"I am." An unknown voice proclaimed, and I quickly turn my head one eighty to find that a white faced owl had listened to our conversation, and they were covered nearly from head to toe in bandages.

"Um, who're you?" Gylfie asked the stranger.

"Apologies for the intrusion, but, my name is Liz. I overheard you talk about that traitor, Allomere. I think I can help you all."

"Well, Liz, we all appreciate your offer, but you're clearly in no shape to fight." Otulissa says to the owl, but she quickly shakes her head.

"I've been through worse. Besides, I know my way around Pure Ones, I know their tactics, their strategies. And you guys will need all the help you can get."

"Alright, you can join us," Soren crosses his wings. "But just leave the fighting to us." The newcomer nods her head, pleased with the result. "Any objections?" He asked, and when nobody spoke up, he continued. "Okay… let's get our Guardians back!" We all quickly exited the hollow, and flew high into the air and away from the tree. One thing was left in my mind as we soared over the ocean.

 _Those are words to die for, Soren. Even if no one does._


	20. Chapter 20: Something Old, Something New

**Hey, people, once again, sorry for the rather long wait. I've been focused on other things in my life, and I sort of forget about the chapters that I'm supposed to be writing. My apologies.**

 **Also, shameless cameo of a book that I really liked when I was growing up in the next chapter.**

Chapter 20: Something Old, Something New

? Nights before the arrival of the "Lord"

When I woke up from my sickly slumber, I heard two voices speak to each other. I tiredly opened my eyes, and I was covered in the red blanket, and the rag was still draped on top of my head, now feeling uncomfortably damp. I wriggled and stirred in the blanket, and since I was feeling both lethargic and lazy, I simply angled my head in a way so that the rag would fall off. I succeeded in accomplishing the task, the piece of wet cloth plopping down to the wooden floor. and that was when the two helpful strangers from last night noticed my awakening.

"Hey, Nico, looks like she finally woke up." TJ, the barking owl, said, and the two walked up to me, as I tried to get myself back up.

"Here, let me help you." Nico said as I was struggling to kick off the remainder of the blanket off of me, offering a wing. I quickly took it in mine, and I was surprised by how strong the big owl was. I knew he must have been strong, but he lifted me up like I was a tiny thin twig.

"Thanks," I tiredly murmured to him, in a half-asleep daze. "Remind me… because I can't seem to recall, what are we going to do tonight again?"

"Well, that depends on how you feel." TJ replied.

I wasn't in the greatest of moods, I was tired and drained, and my leg was definitely sore, but the quicker I get to The Beaks, the quicker I could rendezvous with the others. And, I didn't want to endanger any innocent people by my presence, either.

"I think I'm... okay," I eventually answered to the two, and my stomach began to quietly rumble, signifying that it was running low on fuel. "Um, you guys wouldn't happen to have a vole or mouse around here, would you? Maybe even a rabbit, or perhaps a leg of lamb?"

"We don't, but it shouldn't be too hard to find one for you." TJ said, and then Nico shook his head.

"Anna, how do you feel about hunting _with_ us, instead of waiting? You don't have to lay a talon on our prey, but you can help us track them down. How's that sound? A good flight and a hunt will help wake you up. Always does for me."

"Sounds good to me." I shrugged my shoulders. I've hunted a couple of times before with Leon and Liz, as well as Frazier, but it never hurts to keep up and practice my skills. Carefully, I picked up the satchel and slung it over my shoulder, and hopped over to the hole of the hollow with my good leg, and I follow the two outside. Hopefully, nobody would get any ideas and try to take it from me.

We flew from tree to tree, which were still wet from the storm last night, the leaves dropping huge droplets of water down to the ground, some hitting my own feathers. From branch to branch, we maneuvered our way to… wherever they wanted to go. I don't know how long we did this, but after some time, Nico had stopped us on another low hanging branch with a wing.

"Alright, now Anna, what do you see down there?" He whispered, and pointed down to the ground. I noticed that there were animal marks left in the muddy dirt.

"Paw marks, maybe a hedgehog or a raccoon. They're way bigger than most of the family of Rodentia." I quietly said back to the big owl. While some of my knowledge about different animals (mostly mammals and birds) come from those hunting sessions with my friends and my father, most of what I know stems from all the books about anatomy and taxonomy back at the infirmary.

"How fresh would you say those tracks are?" TJ softly asked me.

"I don't know, I can't really judge from up here." I knew that if I had mistaken the tracks for the wrong animal, there could be serious consequences waiting for us. Fortunately, Nico formulated a plan that was at the very least, not insane.

"Tell you what? You can go down there, and I'll keep watch from up here. If you hear _anything_ , fly away. I'll yell at the top of my lungs and distract the predator, should that ever happen, but it shouldn't take too long. All you have to do is see if those paw marks are bigger than the size of," Nico looks towards the barking owl, and awkwardly coughed into his broad wing. "Avians of smaller stature than myself. If it is, we won't bother with that animal. Are you ready?" He asked, and I took a moment to collect myself before giving him an answer.

"Ready."

With that word, I had hurriedly landed down on the ground, and immediately began to further analyze the size of the paw marks. The sounds of the forest had turned a bit more imposing and sinister, now that I was on the ground. Because being on the ground was very dangerous for any bird, I had to be fast and nimble. Luckily, it didn't take long for me to see that the marks were clearly bigger than both myself and TJ by a fair margin. I leapt back up to where the two were perched. Sticking around would have been _really_ bad.

"Yeah, those marks belong to a very large animal, no doubt about it. No food for us." I sadly said, just as my stomach began to voice its disapproval. Nico looks at me understandably.

"Well, at least you know when to fold 'em, so to speak." He assured. "You know, there's other kinds of prey that we can hunt."

"Really?" I questioned, thinking of other, less harmful creatures we could eat.

"Of course, just watch me." He answered, and then he silently peered at the bark of the tree. I said nothing, as he listened intently for any noises. Suddenly, we saw a bizarre, almost alien in design creature that I had only seen in books. It had a bunch of numerous tiny legs, with a dark crimson red carapace, flicking its furry little antennae, clacking its mandibles, slowly crawling closer to us. Nico picks the creature up like it was nothing but a toy, and shows it to me.

"What exactly _is_ that?" I had a vague idea of what the bug looked like, but I did not know the name. The only bugs I knew for sure that we had back at Aggies were crickets, the occasional scorpion and… spiders (I know, spiders are technically arachnids, but come on, they're all creepy and disgusting).

"It's a centipede, Anna. You've never seen one in your life?" TJ asked, and I shook my head.

"Not really, and to be honest, I'm wondering why we'd ever eat one of… those things." I mentally cringed at the thought of the bug crawling on my skin.

"Oh, but that's the real beauty of the centipede. You know, we even have a song for them." Nico said, re positioning his talons so that the many legged bug wouldn't escape. TJ rolls his eyes and groans loudly.

"Nico, you know I hate that song." TJ sighed exasperatedly.

"Come on, you know that's not true," Nico cooed. "You love it."

"I loved it when I was a week old, dude. Now, not so much."

"Teej," The big owl looked at the barking owl with pleading eyes and even gets down on one knee, which was hilarious because of both the size difference between the two and how utterly gruff his voice was. And also because the branch shook slightly from his weight. "Please, could you do it for me?" The big owl sweetly asked. I could tell that the barking owl was trying his hardest to resist the effects of Nico's persuasive abilities, but eventually, TJ caved in.

"Fine, Fine." He says, letting out another breath of air. "Are you gonna start it, or should I?"

"Let me do it this time." He said, and he cleared his throat a couple times. He stood nice and tall as he let go of the centipede on the branch, but funnily enough, instead of escaping, it began to climb on his body. And then, his beak opened wide, and started to sing.

What gives you a wriggle

And makes you giggle  
When you eat 'em?

Whose weensy little feet  
Make my heart really beat?  
Why, it's those little creepy crawlies.

His singing voice, while still deep and masculine, was shockingly very good. It was a baritone-esque tone, and it was smooth and it honestly sounded kind of rehearsed. TJ sung the second part of this strangely amusing song, and his voice was definitely higher than Nico's, but he was just as good as the big owl's. Their little orchestra soon put a smile on my face.

That make me feel so jolly.  
For the darling centipede  
My favorite buggy feed  
I always want some more.

When the unusual song came to a crescendo, the two joined their voices together to create a very unique sounding harmony, the centipede amusingly skittering over to the top of Nico's head, although he paid it no attention.

That's the insect we adore  
More than beetles, more than crickets,  
Which at times give us the hiccups.  
We crave only to feed  
On a juicy centipede  
And we shall be happy forevermore.

When the duet finished their song, they bowed like true gentlemen. The song was definitely funny, and entertaining, so I clapped with my wings, still smiling a childish smile.

"That was… just, wow!" I cried out in ecstasy. I started laughing for who knows how long, while TJ embarrassingly put a wing over his eyes.

"Glad you liked it so much, Anna," Nico said. "We're not the best, but we aim to please. Isn't that right, Teej?" He nudged the barking owl with his entire body, making TJ's hold on the branch falter for a second before quickly recovering.

"I'm just glad we got it over with," TJ mutters, apparently still embarrassed. even if their performance wasn't bad. "Can we please just give it to her?"

"Sure, let me just…" He looks around for the centipede, but I think he didn't know where it was. "Where'd it go?" He asked us confusedly, and when he turned around, the centipede had climbed around to his back, clinging on tightly. TJ gave me a look that simply said, "Don't tell him." I went along with his wordless command, and the barking owl had a very hard time trying to keep himself composed. However, I was cool as winter's rain.

 _I loved to play jokes with Frazier when I was younger. I remember one time, where I was frinked off about having to do a double night patrol, I cleverly used a heated metal rod to artificially heat up my head, feigning that I had a fever, cough and all._

 _Of course, Frazier stepped in and took me into the infirmary to heal my sickness, but of course, he figured it out. He didn't punish me, though, and we spent some much needed time alone, reading._

"Guys, do you know where is it?" He asked, becoming increasingly more panicky over time. "We sung the song and everything, for Glaux's sake! Where the Hag is it?!" He exclaimed.

"I don't know, check under there." TJ was on the verge of cracking up, but he remained calm for the sake of the joke. He points underneath the branch we were perched on. Nico hastily did something that I never knew an owl was capable of, as he comically flipped around the branch, and hung upside down like he suddenly became a bat, or he was one in a past life.

"Grr, It's not here!" Nico growled, slowly becoming enraged. He swung himself back, and the realization that had been setting into his face was absolutely one of the best things I had ever saw. We both laugh out loud, and and we were dying from hysteria.

"Oh, my Glaux, I can't believe you'd fall for it!" TJ said in between his gasps of air. The big owl stared at us, and tried to look unamused at first, but broke down and joined in our mirth.

After we had finally managed to regain some sense of clarity, Nico had given the centipede to me. I was a bit disgusted as the bug continued to wiggle in my talons, and they must have noticed my apprehension.

"Anna, try biting the head off, first. See if you like it or not." Nico told me, and I hesitantly followed his instructions. After a few moments of wondering if we had all gone yoicks because we decided to eat bugs instead of mammals, or that the owl body had a bout of insanity and evolved to digest these things, I tore into the centipede's head with my beak. At first, I wanted to hate it, but as the dismembered part of the creature makes its way down my throat and into my stomach, I was surprisingly pleased with its taste. It was salty, but then again, it was also kind of sweet and juicy, hence part of the song.

"How's it taste?" TJ asks, but I put up one of my free talons so they'd have to wait for me. I proceeded to quickly devour the rest of the creepy crawling morsel. The small meal wasn't enough to completely sate me, yet it would have been enough until later on during the night.

"Didn't believe it at first, but it was really good." I replied to the barking owl. I had almost forgotten, but Nico and TJ hadn't eaten anything ever since we had left the hollow. "Aren't you guys hungry, though?"

"I think we'll be fine until we get to," TJ answered, hanging on to the word "to" for longer than necessary. "You know who."

"You know, who?" I repeated, obviously not knowing who he was talking about.

"Up a little ways east is where we're going tonight. I'll warn you right now, we're going to another owl's hollow that well, the person who lives in it is a bit on the… insane side." Nico told me. "We just need a couple things from her, and then we'll leave."

 _Oh right, my leg needs stitches. It's hard to keep track of things like that when I was having fun._

"She's the _only_ owl around here that has what we need?" I questioned the big owl, not exactly wanting a person who had a penchant for insanity to treat my wounds.

"Among other things, like dried food and plenty of fresh water." He said, shaking a wing unsuredly. "Don't worry, she's not going to try and kill us or anything like that. At worst, she'll probably just yell at us all or something."

"Um, Nico, did you forget the time that she yanked a bunch of our feathers while we slept in her hollow?" TJ inquired, cracking his neck to the left and right.

"Wasn't that for research purposes? Didn't she say that she was trying to concoct a new medicine, and she needed them to make it?" TJ shook his head.

"She never did, she just kept them in a jar. I bet you that they're still there, even after all this time."

"Um, you guys," I interrupted their conversation. "Could we have this chat later? I don't really feel like walking on one foot for the rest of my life, you know?"

"Uh, Yes, Anna," The barking owl stammered. "We're sorry, but I guess we're not used to having another person around. We kind of just go back and forth for a long time."

"Well, you're the one who brought it up, Teej!" The big owl retorted.

"Whatever! Let's just go before the sun comes out." TJ jumped off the branch, and we closely followed his trail. A platoon of Pure Ones would be bad, even if Nico seemed to be a strong man. I don't think he could fight _all_ of them at once. Especially if they had armor and battle claws.

We continued to fly from tree to tree, although we were soon approaching a threshold that didn't permit us from keeping our current course of action. The number of trees gradually began to decrease over time, and I was beginning to become more and more anxious and worried for our safety. Frazier had said that they would hound us until we got to The Beaks, and his fear was certainly justified. My "family" don't take too kindly to turnfeathers, and they were not above holding a grudge for a long time.

Eventually, we were forced to remain in the open without any coverage. If we were going to be attacked, now would be a good time to do so. I kept looking around for any signs of activity in the air besides us. I didn't want to be caught off guard. My heart was starting to beat faster and faster in my chest, the awful dread weighing heavily on me. My gizzard clenches in fear, as we move forward to our destination.

Just imagine the relief that washed over me when I saw a single lone tree, off in the far distance, a living beacon of safety situated upon a hill. I flew ahead of the two, speeding to the tree. I saw an opening to the owl's hollow, the roots of the tall plant sprawling all over the ground, some even hanging over the hill. I settled down close to the entrance of the hollow, and waited for the two to arrive.

I try to shake off the anxiety. And, I'll admit this now, sometimes after a stressful encounter, I'll find myself crudely preening my feathers. I've come close to ripping out my feathers dozens of times when I preen like this, although thankfully that hasn't happened yet.

 _I suppose anybody would feel really naked without feathers. I honestly don't know how those Others did it, no fur, no feathers, scales, nothing. I mean, they have those things called "clothes", which were, I think, made of animal hides, non degradable materials that the earth would surely not appreciate having them in its oceans, and, whatever else, but, wouldn't you feel heavy with them on?_

 _Why am I still talking about this? Oh, right, waiting for those two._

When the two owls joined up with me, I quickly stopped my cleaning session. Preening wasn't something you do when others are nearby, unless they're really close to you.

"I guess you're as eager as us to see her, Anna," The barking owl says. "Although I can't imagine anybody would _willingly_ volunteer to speak to her. She's frinking insane in the membrane. "

"Hey, keep your voice down!" Nico loudly whispers to the barking owl. "You know she's up right now, don't you?"

"So?" TJ replies. "I don't think she'll turn us down if we come with someone who's injured. Just, come on, let's face our fate together, shall we?" TJ was the first to fly over to the entrance to the hollow, and Nico looked like he was regretting his decision. When I noticed, I voiced my thoughts to him.

"She can't be _that_ bad, can she?" I quietly asked the big owl, who had sighed to himself before answering me.

"You'll know when we get inside." And with that, he followed TJ in the hollow. I was worried that I was signing my own death warrant with Glaux for a second, but I reasoned that I needed her help and her supplies if I was going to continue my journey. I flew to the hollow's entrance, and I was instantly greeted with the scent of a particularly strange odor that I could not pinpoint its origins. It smelled like… a dead rat? A dead rat mixed with body odor and the acidic juice of a strong, relatively fresh fruit. Whatever it was, it wasn't that pleasant. I dropped off my satchel on the floor, as I quizzically gazed at the contents of the hollow.

What was even stranger was that there was a variety of exotic and weird items scattered all around. There was a humongous stack of books in one corner of the hollow, dozens upon dozens of scrolls and plenty of silver tools laid haphazardly on the ground. However, I noticed that last part too late, because I had stepped on something sharp with my foot, causing me to growl in pain.

"Racdrops! That hurt like a, ugh!" I quietly curse to myself, sitting on the floor and trying to alleviate the pain by rubbing my foot with my good one. When I felt better, and the pain had all but passed away, I looked up and saw that Nico and TJ were both looking at me with very wide eyes. "What?" I questioned, but I was given nothing. I soon realized that something was behind me. Or, more specifically, _above_ me.

Suddenly, something large tackles me to the ground, and it had painfully forced its sharp talons around my throat. It was already getting harder and harder to breathe, as I tried to push the avian off of me, but to no avail. It wouldn't budge. I quickly turned my head to see that Nico had slowly approached the assailant, holding his wings up in the air.

"Hey, Rose, let's just stay calm here. Just, please, let the girl go." The big owl pleads, and for a moment, the owl's grip on my throat had weakened. I then heard the voice of the attacker reply to him.

"Why should I!? She's one of them, isn't she?" She insanely questions, and she begins to crush my throat with her talons once more. Nico takes another small step forward, and TJ does the same.

"She's not, Rose. Listen, we just need your help with her leg, and we'll be gone and out of your feathers." Nico takes another small step forward, and my vision was getting blurry.

"You're a liar! I know for a fact that she was with one of them, the ones that took him away from me! My last hope for this Glaux-forsaken world, and they ruined _everything!_ " The owl shrieked loudly in my ears in unbridled rage. "What's one more for the body count, huh?!"

At that moment, laying there, my life slowly starting to extinguish, like a candle's flame being snuffed out, there was something else inside me, that was beginning to arise deep from within my soul. Something that was getting bigger, something that I could not deny as time moved by. I didn't know what it was, but I did know one thing.

 _I don't want to die._

With one last burst of strength, I drove my beak into the avian's leg, and I almost tear out a chunk of her flesh, causing her to scream in pain, as she fell down on the ground, writhing in agony. I took my chances, and I leapt directly onto her, and in a reversal of fate, I was the one with my talons around her throat.

"You know… I'm getting real… sick, of people like you who get to play Judge, Jury, and Executioner." I coldly rasp out, as she desperately tries to get me to release my hold on her. "Who are you to play Glaux? Who are you to decide who lives and who dies?! You think you know me? You don't know _anything_ about me. I'm not a monster, I'm not like them, not at all." At that point, I decide to let go of the owl. I'm not a murderer. She crawls away from me and pants as she recovers from my stranglehold. She stares at me with widened yellow eyes, no doubt wondering what my next move was.

"My name is Anna, and I am a Pure One, no longer."


	21. Chapter 21: Once More, Unto the Fray

Chapter 21: Once More, Unto the Fray.

"You were a… Pure One?" The barking owl questioned in astonishment, shocked at what I had said. I nodded, there'd be no point in lying to them. I'd give them a shortened version of my story, it's the least that I could do.

"Sadly, yes. For a time, I believed in their speeches, believed in their ideals with blind loyalty, trusted in their "vaunted" wisdom. But, one night, with the help of all my friends, I finally understood. I left with them, although we were separated when we escaped."

Rose had shifted slightly from her position on the ground, looking forlorn. I don't think any of them would have guessed that I was one of them. For a good reason, too.

"I… Forgive me for my behavior… I am truly sorry for what I did, although words themselves do not begin to explain my remorse." She spoke up, her voice barely above a whisper. "You have to understand… they took my son away from me."

"That doesn't mean you had to go and try to kill the girl, Rose!" TJ harshly scolds the horned owl, narrowing his eyes.

"I know that, TJ. I know." She says, peering down at the ground, shame written all over her.

"So, they took your son away?" I asked, thinking of all the owlets that were still there at Aggies. Maybe I could ask the Guardians to rescue them all. That is, if I even make it there, and if they were indeed real, and not just a legend.

"Yes… after I had saved him from a forest fire in the kingdom of Tyto, I nurtured him back to health. And one night, I had forgotten that like every child, he was curious. I didn't see who took him, but when I woke up, he was gone. I searched and searched for weeks, but I couldn't find him." She peers back up at me with teary eyes. "When I finally realized that those bastards took him, I knew that there was no hope for him."

"Do you know what happened to him?" I hesitantly asked, afraid that she might have lunged at me in sorrow and rage. She shakes her head, a few tears escaping her eyes.

"We both know what happened, Anna." She mutters, wiping her eyes with a wing.

"Well… He was a Tyto, right?" I question, thinking of the last time I saw an Alba in there. "What did he look like?"

"Like any other owlet, but with downy white feathers, and… he had those beautiful blue eyes, eyes that I've never seen before on an owl." While she was busy depressedly reminisced bittersweet memories, I raced through my own memory banks in search of an answer.

 _Where have I seen a blue eyed Tyto before? The owlet could have been enlisted in the military, but then I would have seen him with red eyes, right? That's usually what happens to Tytos when they're inducted. I don't know the science behind it, but it happens. So, could he have been a picker? That didn't bode well for his chances of survival. Unless… wait, was he one of the owlets that escaped?_

Oh Glaux, I can't believe it. She was talking about the owlet with the smart mouth, wasn't she? The one who had back talked a guard countless times,and eventually forced them to send another one to personally escort him, on his first night at Aggies? I should know, because _I_ was the one who they sent to watch over him. I was too busy with my duties at the time, refusing to associate with any other picker, so I didn't catch his name. I asked the horned owl for it.

"What was his name?" I inquired.

"Alex." She answered with a sniffle.

"I think… he might still be alive, Rose." I said, and for a moment, she seemed to look at me like I was pulling her leg. That the words that came out of my beak weren't true. But then, her mood had substantially shifted, as she jumped up and off the ground, and surprisingly, she had wrapped her wings around me. I was sorely befuddled and bewildered by the sudden change, although Nico and TJ were probably used to it by now. I wasn't that comfortable having someone who just tried to kill me, hugging me, but I refused to leave her embrace. Who knows what she could do if I did?

"He's alive!? Where is he?! Do you know where he is?!" She rapidly spouted off all these questions in my ears, forcefully shaking me like I was a doll that she played with. I was starting to get dizzy when Nico came up from behind her and pulled her away.

"Let the poor girl breathe, Rose!" Nico exclaimed at the horned owl. When I gathered my bearings, I proceeded to tell her everything I knew.

"Okay, I don't know where he is right now, but from what I could guess, he and a few other owlets were headed off to find the Guardians of Ga'hoole," I informed her, and before anybody else could say that they weren't real, I fished out the leather book from my satchel, and showed it to all of them. "This was given to my friend in Aggies, who in turn, gave it to me when we left. If you guys have any doubts about them existing or not, say your piece now." When I finished, the first person to speak up about their beliefs was Nico.

"Uh, I feel embarrassed to admit it, to be honest, but I think they're real." Nico said, awkwardly shuffling his feet.

"Same goes for me," TJ agrees, nodding his head. "But, then again, I also think that Others still live, so, hag if I know. I mean, who really knows if they're all real or not?"

Just then, we all heard a low chuckle emanate from somewhere, and we all looked over to see that Rose was churring to herself. Her quiet laughter eventually grew into a manic series of cackles and chortles, and she began to roll around on the ground. She even rolled over some of her things that would have probably caused her some pain, yet she continued to laugh like a mad woman.

 _Of all the people that could take care of my leg, I get her? The crazy, formally grieving woman who lost her child to the Pure Ones who just tried to kill me? How do TJ and Nico do it? Their wills must be made of the strongest steel._

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity of endless laughter, she slowly stopped, and walked up to us all, with a very unnerving and creepy smile on her face. She stares at the barking owl with squinted eyes.

"You know, you aren't technically _wrong_ about that, TJ. Where'd you think I got all this stuff from?" She asks us all.

"I thought you got these… things from that weird magpie." Nico says, scrunching his face up. "What's her name, Marge, Mage?"

"Mags. Mags, oh Mags, what a lovely lady she is." Rose answers, apparently getting sentimental on us, crossing her wingtips as she looks up at the tree's interior. "She's got these pretty golden rings and charms that she wears and SHE DIDN'T GIVE ONE TO ME WHEN I ASKED FOR ONE!" She shouts out the top of her lungs, waving her wing menacingly in the air, scaring the souls out of us. She clears her throat before she continued. "Yes, I did get some of this from her, but not everything."

She walks over to a smaller stack of books and picks one of them up and sets it down next to us. I gasp in disbelief when I read the title.

"The Magic Tree House?! Where'd you get this?" I questioned the horned owl. I thought that Frazier was the only person with a copy of the story. And not only that, but this book was nearly pristine, and as I scrolled through the contents of the book, I saw that no pages were missing, or damaged. The pages were just faded yellow with age, with that familiar crinkle to accompany them when I flipped them.

"The Magic Tree House?" TJ confusedly repeated.

"Yeah, What even _is_ that language? How'd you guys learn it? And what are those two creatures on the cover?" Nico inquires, pointing at the two protagonists of the book. He was just as confused as the barking owl.

"It's one of the languages of Others, English. Those creatures are actually Others themselves. I'm surprised that you know it, Anna. Not too many people around here can recognize it for what it is." Rose replies to me. "Did your friend teach it to you?"

"Yeah, he's the one who taught me it, among other things. When I was still a small owlet, he'd read a few chapters of this to me before I went to sleep." I said, vividly remembering the exciting adventures of Jack and Annie as they traipsed through different worlds and times using the titular tree house. "What else do you got?"

Rose quickly went up to one of the corners of the hollow and retrieved a small red device from the ground. She walks up to me and gestures for me to take it. I do, and I closely examine the strange object. It was made of a perplexing material that was definitely softer than leather, but harder than glass. There were two small squares protruding outward.

"Look inside, Anna. You see that little black switch on the left? I'll flip it, you just watch and see what happens." Rose instructs, and I begin to gaze into the device. Amazingly, I saw a beautiful Other home, with the morning sun rising in the sky. When Rose flipped the switch, the image had changed. Now, there was a young girl playing with a blond furred canine in the grass, the canine's long tongue lolling out of the side of its face. Oddly, the dog had white fur underneath its maw. Was that a discoloration, caused by an illness or old age? Or something else? She flips it again, and there was the same girl, and she was weeping to herself on a single branch of a tree, no dog with her this time.

The third image showed the sun setting, and the girl had dozed off into a deep slumber on the branch. The fourth revealed the moon, shining brightly in the night sky. In the second to last, The sun had returned, and the girl had woken up to the sight of her parents, comforting her with a warm hug. In the last, I saw that the tree had grown significantly in size, and the leaves were blooming beautiful white flowers all over, and, there was a small sign dug in next to the tree.

"Man's best friend will always live on." Read the sign, and I found myself beginning to tear up from the series of pictures, although I wasn't sure why.

"Liked what you saw?" She questions, and I nod, blinking back the tears in my eyes.

"That was… I don't even know what to say." I said, completely gobsmacked at the wordless story I had just read.

 _I knew that the Others were capable of mystical and whimsical things, like creating huge imposing stone castles that would last for who knows how long, but this was bordering on the divine side. How'd they capture the images of the world, and store them inside this tiny little thing?_

"Anna, can you give me that thing? I wanna see it." TJ asked, and I gave him the device. With the help of Nico, he was able to see what I had seen, but he would not know the true significance of the last picture. When the barking owl was done with the contraption, he seemed to also be quite stunned by the images he had seen. "Rose, what even _is_ this? What's it called?" He questioned the horned owl.

"It's a View-Master. Or, at least, that's what the Others call it." She replied.

 _View-Master, huh. Weird, but oddly fitting for the machine._

"So, was this one of the things you got from Mags, or…?" Nico asked, and then trailed off, waiting for Rose to answer him.

"Nope, not even close." She happily states, wagging a talon in front of the owl. "Where I got this from, it's faaar away from here."

"The Northern Kingdoms?" TJ questioned, and she shook her head. "Beyond the Beyond?" She shook her head again. "Rose, I'm running out of far away places that I know of!"

"Still not close, TJ," She says with a giggle. "Just wait here," she tells us all, and goes over to another disorganized pile on the ground, and she begins to dig through the contents of the clutter. She throws all these strange things, some of them almost hitting us. She throws something with her talons at my direction, and I barely manage to avoid the object. TJ and I quickly went behind Nico and hid from the onslaught of junk and things.

"Why am I the meat shield here?" Nico anxiously asks to the two of us.

"You're the bigger target, dude." TJ slyly jested to the owl, who grumbles something under his breath before turning around and easily lifting up the barking owl, causing him to yelp in shock. "Put me down, Nico!" He desperately pleads to him.

"Nah, don't feel like it." He said to the barking owl, sounding like an owlet with a deep voice. Suddenly, Rose threw a furry little thing and it had landed directly on top of TJ's forehead.

"What in Glaux's name _is_ this?!" TJ exclaimed in horror, trying to shake off the strange object. Nico casually lets go of the barking owl and picks it up with a wing, and waves it in front of TJ's face.

"It's a dried up young tarantula, Teej. On a scale of one to ten on scare factor, this pretty much ranks at zero." Nico snidely joked, and smirked at him.

"You know I don't like spiders. They taste bad and they look bad and I feel terribly sick when one of them walks all over me." Nico replies, and I full heartedly agree with that sentiment. I hate spiders, more than scorpions and more than bats (bats personally just make me super nervous, period).

"A-ha!" Rose yells out, seemingly finding what she was looking for. "This is what I wanted to show you guys." She walks over to us, and outstretches a talon, revealing something that I had a hard time trying to figure out what it was. It resembled a piece of coal, yet I could swear, for a moment, I saw the inner core of it, and it shined a very dim color of orange. Almost like it had at one point was a powerful thing, but now it lost most of its strength, yet it still trudged along regardless. Like a dying star.

 _On its last legs…_

"Now, this little guy is almost out of juice, but if I wanted to, I could use to it travel far distances in a split second." Rose told us, and I immediately wanted to know more.

"How's that even possible? This...tiny piece of coal?" I gestured to the minuscule rock.

"Coal?" She says with a churr. "That's kinda insulting its heritage, you know? Coal lights up things, but I can't do much else with it."

"So, what is it?" I inquired.

"It's a secret." She whispers to me, and I was really disappointed with her answer. Was she just trying to trick us for her amusement? Just another joke to play on us?

"Alright, Rose, if we're done talking about your not-coal coal, we need you to stitch her leg back up." TJ interjects, and the horned owl quickly nods, and proceeds to get a spool of thread and a needle.

"What can Nurse Rose do for you tonight, your grace?" She questions me, cracking up at the end. I simply unwrap the now dirtied bandage on my leg, and show my injury to her. "Woah, that's a pretty bad fender-bender you got there, huh?"

 _Fender-bender? Does she mean femur-bender?_

"Never fear, for I am here! Hand me your leg, will you?" She asks, and I comply, trying my hardest not to cringe from either pain or dumb jokes. She gazes deeply at the site, and then she starts to stab my skin with the needle. I feel a sharp stinging pain, but I said nothing. "That hurts too much for you, darling?" She stopped, and questioned me.

I shook my head, the pain would eventually go away. She continues to stitch, and I noticed how she had an air of superb confidence and professionalism in her work. She reminded me of Frazier, who was always the calm and collected in the infirmary. It was very jarring, to say the least. To see how quickly her demeanor, her speech, her entire being shifting so fluidly and erratically, but I'm thankful for her, despite her trying to kill me. I don't know what I would have done if someone took my own son or daughter away from me.

Soon, Rose was finished, grinning at her handiwork. I looked down and saw that the wound was closed with almost a dozen stitches, and it wasn't sloppy at all. I experimentally flexed my leg, and apart from it being sore, it wasn't that bad. Rose put on a fresh bandage on it, and we were both satisfied.

"Good as new!" She slaps my back with her wing, which was honestly putting it lightly. It was more like slamming my back with her wing, full-force. "Now, I don't mean to pry, but what exactly is your plan?"

"Well, I'm supposed to meet up with my friends in The Beaks first. Then, I'll see the Guardians. They're the ones who can save the owlets back at Aggies." I reply, and Rose instantly jumped in eagerness, clapping her wings enthusiastically. I knew what she was going to say before the words left her beak.

"I'm coming with you! If there's a chance that I'll see my son, I'll take it!" She says, and then Nico and TJ made their way closer to us.

"Is it alright if we join you too? We kinda want to see our idols, if you know what I mean." Nico said, and I nod.

"Sure, the more the merrier. Besides, I'll need all the help I can get to make it there. Who knows what could be out there?" I say with a smile.

"Snakes the size of bushes! Skunks that melt your face off with their noxious gas! Wolves with an inferiority complex! Or maybe a group of raving cannibals?!" Rose remarked to us, causing TJ to roll his eyes. "The makings of a true adventure, no doubt!" Nico gazes outside the hollow, with a slightly worried look on his face.

"Well, if we leave now, we'll risk the chance of getting mobbed by crows. And, I'm not sure if anyone would just ignore your home, Rose. Should we go anyway?" He asks her, and Rose energetically nods her head.

"Crows, schmoes, we'll be fine. I'm a black-belt martial artist, they won't know what hit 'em!" She replies with a few punches and kicks. None of us knew what that meant, but I assume that she thinks she's an expert at fighting. "My stuff'll still be here, nobody ever comes around anyway. Now, come on, we're burning moonlight!"

Knowing that the horned owl wasn't exactly in the most stable of mind, we refused to object. She was overwhelmingly determined to see her son, and we weren't going to stop her. Before we leave, she gives me her precious rock.

"Put this in your bag. Worst comes to worst, you can use this for help." She said, and I quickly place the thing inside my satchel. I sling it over my shoulder once again, and Rose runs out of the hollow and leaps into the air, laughing loudly, and doing barrel rolls.

Nico and TJ say nothing, and they follow in her footsteps, jumping out of the hollow. Before I left with them, I thought of my other friends once more.

 _I'll see you all again, just you wait. Liz, you can snap at me with all the sarcasm in the world, Leon, I know you love to read, so I'll share you some of the legends with me when I see you again. And Frazier… you can hold me in your wings again._

 _In this world or the next, I'll be right there with you guys. I promise._


	22. Chapter 22:Reasons to Fight

Chapter 22: Reasons to Fight

I knew that the journey would be long, and perilous, and I should have expected that Rose would have an unlimited amount of energy (it seems as if going insane provided a major power boost to your stamina), but this was getting tiresome. We had been flying nonstop for who knows how long, and my wings were beginning to scream out for the sweet release of mercy. Still, if nobody else would say anything, I guess I can't.

However, that won't stop me from saying something about our rapidly changing surroundings. For a long time, we only saw trees, grasslands, hills, that sort of stuff. Typical of Ambala, but now there were less and less of anything. The ground was turning into a bright yellowish brown, and now, the sun was out, making the ground shine, and, I could see the wind in the air seemed to appear hazy and scraggly. The only "trees" that we did see were very thin and spiky, and the only other plant was this strange barbed green thing.

Wait, was the ground this, sand, thing that I had heard from Frazier before? That I've read in stories? When and if we set down on the ground, maybe I should take a closer look.

"Um, Rose!" TJ shouts out to the horned owl, who slowed her speed and flew next to the barking owl.

"Yes, dearie?" She sweetly questions.

"Okay, why are we in… The Kuneer Desert?!" He profusely yells to her. She simply laughs at his exclamation.

"Why not?" She asks with a grin.

"I can list a few good reasons. One, it's a desert. Two, it's hot. Three, there's no water at all, Four, there's sandstorms, and oh, did I forget that it's a desert!" TJ angrily yells to the horned owl.

"Quit being such a worrywort. Tell you what, since you're all apparently dying from exhaustion, why don't we rest up in that little cave over there?" She starts to fly faster to a small cavern dug into the ground. We take her cue and quickly follow her inside the cave. Dozens of tiny stalactites hang above us, and I was regrettably reminded of Aggies. TJ takes two steps before collapsing in a heap on the floor. And funnily enough, Nico slowly walks up to him and does the same.

"I hate… the desert." The barking owl murmured before closing his eyes and falling asleep.

"You said it, bud." Nico tiredly replied to TJ, and then he also fell asleep. It wasn't long before I could hear the two snoring. Rose walks up to me while I try to find a good position on the stony floor. She notices my inherent discomfort, and lays down on the ground as well.

"Here, I got an idea." She whisper to me. "Sleep on me."

"Sleep on you?" I question incredulously, wondering if she had truly lost her mind. Although, I shouldn't have to guess that.

"Yeah, it actually works pretty well. Just, come on, you need the sleep."

I couldn't argue with that. I was dead tired from the flight here, and we haven't even reached Tyto Forest yet. I set my satchel down and crawl my way to her, propping my head against her body. She was definitely warm, and her feathers were surprisingly soft, like the down of an owlet.

"Better?" She quietly asks me.

"Definitely." I reply, quickly becoming more and more drowsy as the seconds pass us by.

"Good light, Anna." She says to me, and I do the same.

"Good light, Rose."

" _Mr. Frazier, can we read more of that story? What's it called, The Something Something?" A young girl asked, and Frazier let out a soft chuckle._

" _The Ugly Duckling, Anna. And yes, we can certainly do that." The eagle owl replies to the owlet, as they walked over to the man's room. Anna plops down on his nest, and he picks up a small book and places it next to her. He climbs into the nest with her, and she snuggles herself deeply into his thick feathers._

" _Now, where were we?" He questions to the owlet, flipping a few pages in search of where he had left off in the story. He flips another time, and the owlet was quick as a flash._

" _Right there!" She says to the eagle owl. He clears his throat, and begins to narrate the tale._

 _The "duckling", whenever he had awoken, did not know what to do anymore. He was hesitant to remember yesterday's events, and when he inevitably did, his poor aching heart was ready to break in two. And yet, despite everything, there was a part of him that wanted to seek out that which he had never had. And so, as he left the dark cave behind him, he began to desperately search for a family._

 _He made his way past the other ducks, and tried to ignore their jeers and scowls. He tuned out the world around him, waddling through the tall grass. He made his way through the rolling hills of the farm, past the judging stares of dozens of different animals. He trudged along to the beat of his own two feet._

 _When night rapidly approached, and the boy was becoming hungry, he decided to settle down inside an abandoned storehouse. He waddled on the damp ground, and hungrily devoured a healthy helping of wriggly pink worms._

" _Ewwww!" Anna disgustedly exclaims, sticking her tongue out. "That's nasty!"_

" _Actually, lass, they're quite the good snack for us. And, they're high in protein and calcium." He informs the owlet, before making his words more understandable for the girl. "They can help you grow big and strong. You want to be big and strong like me, right?"_

" _I don't wanna eat them, though!" She retorts._

" _You don't have to, Anna. Plenty of owls don't like bugs or worms either, no shame in that." He kindly says to the owlet. "Now, let's continue, shall we?"_

 _When the boy was sated, he softly yawned and laid down on a pile of hay. He quickly fell asleep underneath the rotting wood, and when he awoke, he continued his quest for a better life. He searched far and wide for the illusive idea, it became a routine for the duckling. During the day, he'd walk and walk until he could not walk anymore, and slept wherever he could at night._

 _Weeks quickly passed by the duckling, and then those weeks turned into months. The trek throughout the land had changed him, although he could not bear to gaze at his reflection. All that he knew was that he was maturing into… something else._

 _The time of fall had ended, and it was replaced by the chilling winds of winter. His feathers weren't adequately suited for the cold, and he found himself shivering constantly. Nothing would warm him up, even shelter did little to help the boy._

 _Suddenly, the boy noticed that the wind was blowing frozen water on him. The water, when it made contact with his feathers, melted and chilled him even more. He continued moving forward, looking for something, anything that could help him._

 _But then again, who'd want to help the freak with no name?_

" _I would!" Anna proudly states, and Frazier churrs at the owlet's gentle and kind spirit. How such a soul could come out of this place like this, he didn't know. Nevertheless, he was eternally grateful for her presence._

 _Two more steps on the frozen ground, and the boy could walk no further. Try as he might, his body just didn't respond to his commands. All he could do, was weep to himself. He closed his eyes and waited for the world to finally go black. To make his suffering finally end, once and for all._

 _But, it never came. He opened his eyes once again, and he saw something, in the distance. And it was getting closer to him. He soon realized that it was two other ducks!, For a moment, he wished that they would rescue him. Although, he remembered the last time he spoke to one. One of them quickly made their way to the boy._

" _What's a kid like you doing in a blizzard?!" The duck inquisitively shouted over the winds of old. "Quick, come over here and help me!" He cried out to his companion, who swiftly picked up the duckling and hoisted him onto their back._

 _Even if the boy was almost on the brink of passing into a deep slumber, he wanted to know one thing before he went._

" _Whuh… why?" He quietly whispered to them. The duckling saw the bigger avian look at him and, the boy saw something that he had never saw once in his life. The duck was smiling at him._

" _A kid like you doesn't deserve this. Dying out here in the snow alone." The duck answered, and the boy was hesitant, but he returned the gesture, and smiled back at the avian. The boy fell asleep, and this time, he would come back to a world that wasn't all bad. He'd come back, hopefully, to what he really wanted._

 _Sadly, Frazier had closed the book at that moment, earning the ire of an irritated Anna._

" _Mr. Frazier! I wanna know what happens next!" She whined to the eagle owl, who placed a wing on her head._

" _Another time, lass." He says, readjusting his position on the nest. "Time for you and me to go to sleep."_

 _She huffs, but she complies, sinking even deeper into the owl's feathers. However, she wanted to know one thing before she went off to dreamland._

" _Hey, Mr. Frazier, can you promise me that you'll really finish the story next time?" She asks the avian._

" _Of course. I promise." He replies with a grin._

" _Cross your heart and hope to die?" She questions._

" _Cross my heart, hope to die, and stick a needle in my eye." He says, and the owlet was finally satisfied with his answer, yawning to herself._

" _Good light, Mr. Frazier." She tiredly murmurs._

" _Good light, Anna."_

" _..._ A! An! Anna!" I heard a voice nearly yell into my ear, forcefully bringing me out of my slumber. I tiredly opened my eyes, stretching my limbs on the bare ground, and I saw that it was noticeably darker in the cave than before. And also Rose, looking very eager for… something.

"It's nice to see you're up, sleepyhead." She quietly joked, and as I got up, she shushed me. "Look over there, at those two." She points to Nico and TJ.

Wow, I honestly can't believe what I'm seeing right now. It seems that at some point during the day, Nico had all but smothered the barking owl, embracing him in his slumber. And he was still snoring, loudly, I might add. Soon, the barking owl was stirring in his sleep, and as he slowly woke up, Rose almost perished from her hysteria and manic laughter. Even I couldn't keep my laughter from escaping my beak. It took awhile for him to realize what we were laughing about, but then he noticed the avian on top of him.

"Oh my Glaux!" He shouts out loud, and he almost wakes up Nico from the volume of his voice. "Um, buddy, time to wake up!" He tells the owl, who merely mumbles something inaudible, before rolling over and nearly crushing his friend. I stopped laughing and pushed the big owl off of TJ. Rose didn't, however.

"You okay, Teej?" I ask the barking owl, and he nods, panting a bit.

"Thanks, Anna. I should have know that that would have happened, but I was just dead tired at the time." He stands next to the waking avian, disapprovingly folding his wings. "Thanks, bud, you almost killed me." He sarcastically said in the avian's ear.

"Wuh, What, I did?" Nico tiredly muttered, yawning.

"You almost made him a TJ sandwich, Nico." Rose says with a stifled churr. Although, I'm afraid that none of us except her knew what the reference was. TJ helps Nico up on his feet, and then we heard something growling. For a second, I thought that it was a predator that had located us all, but by the look of embarrassment on Nico's face, it was just his stomach.

"What, uh, do we have for tweener?" He inquired, and Rose sprinted outside the cave for something. While we were busy trying to figure out what she was doing, she soon came back with a… fox? A vulpine with blond fur and big long ears, sporting a pretty nasty wound on its neck. She dragged the fox across the ground, putting it down near us.

"Bon ap·pé·tit!" She said with a bow, with a slightly bloodied wing. But before we could dig into our food, she collectively slapped the three of us in the face. With that very same wing.

"What was that for?!" TJ questioned, rubbing his beak, both from the pain and because she had smeared blood on it.

"We've gotta cook this bad boy first!" She yells at us. "Anna, do you have some flint on you?"

"I think so." I reply to the horned owl, going over to my satchel and opening it. Luckily, Frazier had packed a decently sized chunk of flint for us to use, in case we ever needed it. I quickly gave Rose the flint, and she picked up a loose stone from the ground.

"Hey, Nico, can you be a dear and fetch me sticks from a tree? One should be about this long." She showed the owl the recommended size of the stick with her wings. "Two should be about as tall as you are, and the rest doesn't really matter." Nico nodded.

"I'd do anything for some of your cooked meat." He said with a smile. Rose gave her own, although it was a lot more mischievous.

"Oh really? I'll have to keep that in mind for next time." She deviously chortles to herself, while Nico quickly left to find what she needed. While we waited for him to return, TJ gestured to me to join him, preferably away from the horned owl. We both sat down on the ground, and I saw that he had my map and compass next to him.

"Hey, Anna, you wouldn't happen to know what this is, do you?" He asked, holding the tool in his talons.

"It's a compass, TJ. The bigger red arrow always points north, and all these letter represent the four directions, north, south, east, and west." I inform the barking owl.

"That's pretty neat. I guess a map would be pretty useless without it. I just wanted to chart our course before we leave." He told me, dropping the compass and hovering a talon over The Kuneer Desert. "We're probably somewhere around here." He points to the western part of the desert. "And we left, somewhere around… here." He then points to the south western part of Ambala. "Where should we go next?"

"Probably the River of Hoole." I suggested, putting my talon on the piece of land. "I think it flows into the Sea of Hoolemere, if we follow it, it'll take us to the northernmost part of The Beaks."

"Oh, yeah, that reminds me," TJ remarked to me. "This map doesn't have the tree's location, obviously, but I've read one of the legends from your book, and it says that the, 'Spines of the Echidna will guide you to the Tree of Ga'hoole'. Although, I'm not sure _where_ the echidna would be."

"I'm sure we'll find it someway. Maybe it's somewhere around the shoreline." I assured the barking owl. Even if we couldn't find this echidna, maybe someone else could help us.

"Avian incoming, I repeat, avian incoming!" Nico shouts out from the outside of the cave. He quickly entered the cave, holding a bundle of sticks in his talons. Rose swiftly took them, and walked outside the cave.

"Anna, can you bring the food out for me?" She questions, and I nod, pushing the dead fox slowly outside the cave and to the horned owl. My feet were now standing upon the grainy dirt known as sand, and I was beginning to get really cold. I could tell that everyone else was also the same, as TJ shivers from the weather. Rose plants two long sticks, or small branches, depending on how tall you were, on the ground, and with the longest one, she proceeds to stab the fox directly behind it, the other half of the stick comes out the other side, peeking out of the vulpine's open maw.

Despite that the animal would surely try to kill us if it was given the chance, I wasn't exactly thrilled seeing it in this position. It's no doubt one of the worst positions a body could have been. Even if they weren't sentient, I still feel sorry for them. Although, this may just be me sympathizing with my food.

Rose digs a small pit in the ground with her feet, kicking up some of the sand away. She places the rest of the sticks in a pile underneath the animal, and then she starts to strike the flint with a rock. After a few unsuccessful attempts, she had managed to create a small fire. She carefully blows on it, and slowly, it grew in size.

"Behold, fellow strigiformes, for I, have created fire!" Rose boastfully proclaims to us, triumphantly puffing out her chest. At this proclamation, I wondered if our eyes were still in our sockets, or on the moon. As the fire became stronger, she began to spin the fox around. While she was busy cooking the fox, Nico hungrily gazes at the vulpine, getting closer and closer, but she cuts him off, whacking him on the head with a leftover stick.

"If you keep gawking at your food like that, then you won't get any, capiche?" She threatened the owl, and he was quick to suppress his instincts. "Anna, why don't you take a… _spin_ , at this? I'm kinda getting tired over here."

 _Glaux, she loves puns, doesn't she?_

I comply, and hold the stick in my wing, occasionally rotating the fox around. The aroma of fresh meat burning was very pleasing to smell. In addition, the fire warmed me up immensely. When my limb had gotten tired as well, I switched positions with TJ, who in turn, switched with Nico. Eventually, after Rose had stoked the flames and threw in some more twigs and refuge into the bonfire, she released the vulpine from its confines, and placed it on the edge of the pit.

"Alright, everybody, now, you can dig in." She smirked, before tearing off a piece of the fox and practically slurping it down. Nico actually managed to dismember the vulpine with his talons, ripping off a foreleg of the fox. Either he's really strong, or the process of cooking made the fox's body soft and pliable.

"You want some of mine?" He asked in between bites to TJ, who almost immediately dug in to part of the leg. I decided to take the other foreleg, and I discovered that my second suspicion was true. Tearing the limb off was an easy task, and I soon began to eat the vulpine meat. I've had cooked food before with Frazier (He found a couple of mice for us to snack on from time to time), so I knew that the taste would be different, but I've never eaten anything this large before tonight.

As I enjoyed my meal in silence, I couldn't help but stare into the flames of the bonfire. The sound of embers flicking off and into the ground was something that was always pleasant to the ears for me. Heh, when I was at Aggies, sometimes I couldn't go to sleep unless Frazier lit a torch in the room nearby.

When I was nearly finished with my food, I saw that TJ and Nico were already done with their meals. I suppose traveling for so long gave the two (especially Nico), a certain voracity for sustenance. Or maybe, they were just _really_ hungry.

Rose was also finished, as she had thrown the bone away, and she was kicking the sand back into the fire pit, dousing the flames until they were no more. I retrieved the map and compass, putting them in my bag and I slung it over my shoulder once more. While some of the fox food still remained, we would never be able to preserve it, so we leave it behind.

"So, are we ready to keep moving?" She asked us, and we all nodded. Now that we no longer had to worry about our nourishment for the night, not until the sun came up, at least, we could continue onward. With that, we all began to fly into the midnight skies of the desert, my goal getting ever so closer to being achieved.


	23. Chapter 23:Calm before the Storm

Chapter 23: Calm before the Storm

Luckily for everyone, the plan TJ and I concocted did eventually work. Of course, we had to take the lead, instead of Rose, much to her displeasure. If she did have her way, I'm sure that we would have actually been at The Barrens, or even Shadow Forest, wandering for all eternity.

After a few more nights spent in the desert, we were eventually spared from the debilitating cold and the terrible heat. We were soon approaching the outskirts of the Tyto Kingdom. It was definitely a better sight to see than the vast nothingness of the sea of sand. I was thrilled to see _actual_ trees, with non-spiky leaves and no dried up bark.

We flew over the landscape, and we even caught a nice draft that propelled us higher into the air, and we didn't have to flap our wings that much. Thankfully, after a short while of flying with the wind catching in our feathers, I heard the sound of water rushing below us. I peered down, and I saw that we had arrived at the River of Hoole.

TJ takes the lead and sets down on a tree that was growing very close to the edge of the river. He perched on a branch that was hanging precariously over the water. I was hesitant at first, but after Nico managed to land on the branch without breaking it, I landed beside the two. Rose was the last to make it to the branch.

Now that we were closer to the ground, the roaring waters below us were louder than before. The moon was starting to rise in the bright night sky, the perfect weather to continue moving up the current of water. I guess we all just needed a break.

Now that I had time to think, I realized that I've never really known what species Nico was. He must be a Bubo, judging from the small ear tufts and a lack of a heart shaped facial disk like how a Tyto would have. Although, that's all I could reasonably infer.

"I know this is a bit out of the blue, but, just what are you Nico?" I questioned the owl, wanting to know the truth.

"What am I?" He quizzically repeated. "Uh, I'm an owl, Anna."

"No, I mean, what _type_ of owl are you? Are you an eagle owl, a horned owl like Rose, or something else?" His eyes quickly light up in realization of what I was trying to ask him.

"Oh, that. Well, I'm a fish owl." He replied with a smirk. "And no, I'm not part fish. My kind can hunt for fish like salmon or trout in the water."

"Really?" I said, and TJ spoke up with his own smile.

"Why don't you show her what you can do? I think she'd like to see that, right, Anna?" He asks me, and I nod. I've never heard of an owl who could fish, as I previously thought that only Others with their mechanical tools could do that.

"Sure, I was getting hungry anyway." Nico says, and then he peers down at the water, looking for a suitable specimen.

He soon spots what he wanted, as he jumps off the branch and with his talons fully outstretched, he swoops down almost to the surface of the water, nearly skimming the liquid with his feet. And then, he lifts up and into the air, and I could see that he had caught a pretty large fish in his talons. He flies back to us, placing the fish on the branch and holding it tightly with one of his talons.

"Pretty cool, wasn't it?" He asks me.

"It sure was!" I exclaim, still not entirely believing that what I had just saw was real or not. "You just yanked that thing outta the water like it was nothing." At that moment, Rose huffed at us all, joining in the conversation.

"It wasn't _that_ cool. Anna, you wanna see something _really_ cool?" She questions me, and I was hesitant to answer her.

"Um, I guess?" I slowly reply, shrugging my shoulders.

"Great, now, just watch me." She says, and TJ quietly churrs to himself, as Nico bites into the head of the fish.

"You're gonna love this." TJ told me, and before I could clarify on what he meant, Rose had suddenly leaped off of the branch and shockingly, she had curled up in the air and dived into the water, making a large splash. I stared in horror, wondering if she was drowning. Thankfully, her head had popped up from under the water.

"Hey, guys, why'd the swimmer go back in time?" She loudly inquired us, using her wings to swim in the water. "Because she's doing the backstroke!" She says with a hearty laugh. For a moment, I didn't get the joke, but then I realized.

 _Oh, my, Glaux. She will never stop, won't she?_

Despite the inherent corniness of the joke, I still chuckled at her sheer randomness. After a few more seconds of floating in the water, Rose had made her way ashore, and she energetically shook off the water soaked in her feathers. She flew back to us with a big cheeky grin on her face.

"Now, was that cooler, or was that cooler?" She says, nudging me with her shoulder.

"Unique, that's for sure." I churred, as TJ dismissively rolls his eyes, while Nico finishes up his fish, downing the rest of the aquatic animal with one gulp.

"Can we leave now?" The barking owl impatiently questioned. "This branch is kinda leaning a bit too much for my liking."

True to what he was worried about, the branch was indeed on the verge of snapping off and into the water. Hurriedly, I took my leave and flew into the air, and everyone else followed suit. I peered back and I saw that the branch was no longer a part of the tree, and was swept away by the current.

 _It's a good thing that he noticed before it was too late. Rose may know how to swim, but I don't._

We continued to move forward alongside the river banks, careful not to fly too low to the ground as to agitate the locals. The sound of the running water was calming, and peaceful. If I wasn't trying to find my friends and the Guardians, I might have wanted to make my own hollow here.

My mind began to wander as there was practically nothing else exciting for me to do. I started thinking of the things that the Guardians would have at this tree. Do they have a queen and king, like the Pure Ones? Of course their rule was absolute, no exceptions. I've heard that they do have advisors and commanders under them, but as far as strategy goes, Metal Beak was the one who called the shots. Usually, that is.

These Guardians, do they have a place like Frazier's inside? And if so, would they accept someone like me? An ex-Pure One? Should I even tell them where I came from?

My thoughts were interrupted by the voice of TJ, shouting excitedly at us. I looked around, and I saw that we had arrived at the point where the river water had met the sea, forming an estuary. If the river was loud, than the ocean was deafening. Even up in the sky, I heard waves crashing into the rocky walls of the shoreline.

"We made it, guys! The Sea of Hoolemere, right here!" TJ, amusingly, started to sound like a gibbering owlet. I think Frazier called it, 'gazooling'. "We're almost there! Speed up a little, guys!"

"I'm going as fast as I can, Teej!" Nico loudly remarked back to the barking owl. As the fish owl tries his best to keep up with TJ's pace, Rose was content to fly with me.

"So, whatcha thinkin about, Anna?" She inquires me.

"Just about, stuff, that's all." I simply reply back to the horned owl.

"What kind of _stuff?"_ She pressed me for the details, and I couldn't ignore her request, so I told her what was on my mind.

"Rose, do you think they'll take me in?" I said. "The Guardians, I mean."

"What makes you think that they would deny you?" She asks, and I let out a sigh.

"I've been a Pure One for my entire life. For the longest time, I was their sworn enemy, for however long the two have existed." I sighed yet again, feeling the weight of regret wash over me. "They'd never accept someone like me." Suddenly, Rose looks at me with angry eyes.

"Don't you ever think about something like that, not when I'm around!" She yells at me, taking me aback for a second. I was instantly reminded of the time she tried to kill me. Luckily for myself, her eyes had softened, her demeanor quickly changed. "You know what my gizzard tells me?" She calmly questions me.

"That you're not entirely sane?" I asked the horned owl, causing her to laugh out loud.

"Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. Right now, it's telling me that you're the sweetest girl I've ever known. Anna, you're smart, kind-hearted, and you know how to crack the occasional joke or two when it matters. Just stop beating yourself up on things you can't control. Besides, what did you say when I met you?"

"I'm no longer a Pure One." I say, remembering the event crystal clear. Rose smiles and nods at me.

"You were right about that. You're something more than just another grunt for their army. Something, better." She kindly says, and I was grateful for her encouraging words. Glaux knows I needed to hear them. "Besides, if they won't accept you, I'll make them. I'm a bla-"

"You're a Black-belt martial artist." I finished for her. "I know, Rose."

"Hey, you stole my line!" She said, the words were accusatory, although her tone betrayed her amusement and joy. I grin at the horned owl.

"Thanks, Rose. I kind of needed a pick me up."

"No prob, Bob." She says, and I didn't really get the reference.

"My name's not Bob." I retort, confusedly turning my head.

"It's a figure of speech. Like, for example, 'Seashells by the sea shore', 'see ya later, alligator' or 'water under the bridge,'" She told me.

"Oh, I get it." I say, as I begun to understand what she was talking about. But, just then, I noticed that something was different. Something was definitely off. The skies seemed to darken, and the air felt heavy and thick. I peered down at the ground once more, and to my right, on the horizon, was a huge black cloud spreading upwards into the sky.

"Is that what I think it is?" Nico worriedly questioned, him and TJ flew closer to us.

"Glaux, it's a fire. A pretty big one, if I might add." Rose exclaimed, looking at the smoke with widened eyes. "I'm getting serious deja vu vibes here, and not in a good way."

I had a troubling, negative and anxious thought run through my mind as I gazed at the fires in the distance.

 _Frazier! Frazier, and the others! Are they caught up in all this?!_

Immediately, I soared to the flames, and I looked back at the three.

"Follow me!" I yelled to them, and they soon matched my pace.

"What's the plan, Anna?" TJ asked as we went on to the disaster that was happening right in front of our eyes.

"My friends could be in danger!" I panickedly told the barking owl. "If they're stuck in there, I gotta help them!"

"Wait just a second, Anna!" Nico ordered to me, and I gazed at the fish owl, wondering what was on his mind. "Do you see them, over there?" He looks down at the ground, and I do the same.

 _Damn it! I thought they wouldn't be here!_

Of course they had to be involved in all this. I tried to escape from their clutches, but they came back. I don't know if they came for me, but that didn't change the fact that there was dozens, if not, hundreds of Pure Ones flying below us. Along with many flocks of bats, as well. I gaze at them for what felt like an eternity, but suddenly, Rose bumped into me, knocking me out of my stupor.

"Anna, you know what you have to do. We'll back you up with everything we've got, right, guys?" She turns her head to TJ and Nico, who nod in affirmation.

"You're our friend, Anna. We wouldn't be good ones if we left you all alone when you needed us." Nico assures me. "Now, come on, I think it's time to kick some tail feathers, wouldn't you agree?"

"Thanks, you guys. I really… appreciate it." I blink back some tears that had formed in my eyes. A part of me still can't believe that I could have found other people in this world who'd stick by me no matter what. Liz, Leon, and now Nico and TJ and Rose, and….Frazier, I'm not alone anymore.

I tell myself that there would be no tears for now. Now, was the time for action.

 _It's just like how Frazier said it, even if it feels like forever since then, I still remember what he told me._

" _There's already too much suffering in the world as of tonight, and there will be more and more as the days and nights go by. If I can relieve even one person of their burdens, then my gizzard will rest quietly, satisfied with the decision I made._

I'm on my way, Da, just hold out a little longer, and I'll be there.

Promise...


End file.
